Blood Stutter
by ToulouseD
Summary: Ishida's dying, Ichigo wants to save him and that opens a can of worms he wasn't prepared for. Commision for the most wonderful Axelkin. Rated M for themes, not for any overt sexy times. And Ishida doesn't die. I feel like I have to add that.


When asked, Ichigo doesn't remember the exact moment he realized that Ishida was dying.

He doesn't remember what day of the week he first saw Ishida looking whiter than bone, with insomnia and daybreaks running from his eyes in dark shadows.

He doesn't recall what they were doing when Ishida collapsed, looking almost relieved to get some rest in his state of unconsciousness.

He can't tell you when Ishida started missing classes, a few at first, quickly turning into many, missing entire weeks.

When asked, Ichigo does't know the exact moment it hits him, but he remembers how Inoue had looked to him when Ishida had started exhibiting outward exhaustion. He remembers how Chad had put a thoughtful hand to his shoulder when the nurse had come to examine Ishida in the middle of lunch. He remembers constantly looking out the window, wondering if Ishida was going to come to school today or not.

Ichigo remembers the way Ishida had shrugged off his worry when they had returned from the Soul King's Palace. He had suffered tremendous defeat, his pride as a Quincy most definitely in shambles and his eyes a little more distant than usual. And Ichigo can't help reminding himself how he had played a central role in that.

Even more to the point, he has trouble forgetting the look in Ishida's eyes when they had both been soaked with sweat and blood, when spirit particles shimmered around Ishida and spirit pressure roamed around Ichigo.

There had been a moment, a second before Ichigo cut his way through Ishida's parry, a mere second before Ichigo slashed both a longtime friend and ally, where they had locked eyes. Deciphering what he had seen was an ongoing process, but whatever it was, it had Ishida lowering his _Scheele Schneider_ minutely. A lifetime passed, and for the second time in his life, he had spilled Ishida's blood.

When they returned, Ishida had walked away from them immediately.

Ichigo supposes it's a few weeks after that Ishida started showing up with sleepy bruises around his eyes, a sharpness caused by humiliation and soul-crushing exhaustion lay about him constantly, making him even harder to approach than usual.

It had been Inoue who had talked to him first.

Chad second.

Ichigo lastly.

It had seemed rash, seemed completely unripe, but his plans was rarely anything else, so he continued towards Ishida's desk – the other scribbling down choice sentences in German, or Spanish, Ichigo was not a connoisseur of languages unlike some – paying next to no attention to the fact that he was doing so on their chemistry homework.

"Ishida?" It seemed as good a place as any to start the conversation. Ichigo truly didn't know what to expect from this, still doesn't know what to take from it. If their situation had been reversed …

Truth is it never would have been. Ichigo never had the luxury of seeing another day if he lost. Ishida and he were fundamentally different fighters. Losing is never an option where Ichigo's concerned.

Ishida kept his eyes on the paper. It was as if he was too tired to even lift his gaze. "Kurosaki."

It was measured, acknowledging, but by no means cordial.

"You know I don't hold it to you, right?"

Ishida exhaled, it sounded too weary to be a sigh, too unintentional.

"You should. I was my own decision."

Ichigo's frown deepened considerably, "You let me win."

"I didn't let you do anything, Kurosaki." Ishida leaned back and finally met his eyes. They had changed since their fight. They seemed less blue, foggy and shallow. _He looks like shit,_ Ichigo thought but softened because even amidst this hailstorm, he held himself with a heavy grace of the spared.

"Fine, if you say so," Ichigo rolled his eyes, "but I know what I saw."

Ichigo had already turned around and was practically marching back to his seat. He caught the words purely by accident. They weren't meant to be, it felt like.

"I doubt that."

They had had better conversations after that. The four of them had taken to doing group assignments together again, they ate lunch together with Keigo, Mizuiro and Tatsuki, and they would go to coffee in the weekends, the movies after school, the arcade when the selection was poor.

It had been careful at first, like thawing a frozen world without breaking it in the process.

However, the air Ishida had about him changed with his pallor, but it only became warmer as he became sicker, an unfair condition of this thaw, it seemed.

It hadn't been long before he started having headaches as well. His veins would begin showing through his skin, not just in the sharp afternoon sun but also in the dullest gray of twilight.

Ichigo may not remember when Ishida first started rubbing his eyes when the light, stark and white, would penetrate the air, nor when he first started covering them throughout class, missing whatever Ochi-sensei wrote on the blackboard in favor of just listening.

He may not recall when it became so bad Ishida began pressing his fingers into his eyes to choke out the soft light from the summer-sun at noon.

Perhaps he can't tell you when Ishida stopped showing up to school all together, but he can sure as hell answer you, how Inoue told him Ishida had been hospitalized until further notice.

When asked, Ichigo can't tell you when, but he could tell you how his blood stopped running and his palms started sweating. Because while Ichigo might not remember when, he most certainly remembered why.

/

Ichigo's head falls back, his leg's bouncing up and down, up and down, up and down, willing time itself to move faster. Inoue's twisting her fingers, eyes glued to the ground, teeth chewing fervently at her bottom lip. Chad is the only one who remains stoic, the only one who doesn't move.

Ichigo glares as every nurse that walks by them, their heels clicking against the tiles, echoing through the neigh empty halls. They seem endless, lit by soft light. There's five groupings of seats, none of them accommodating as many as theirs. There's inlays in the flooring, blue crosses. Ichigo can see 143 from where he's sitting, not that he's been counting them … more than once.

They've been here five times prior to this, never on a Monday or a Thursday. Ichigo had brought cards last time and while he, Chad and Inoue had been playing the dullest round of Go Fish ever, the nurses tripping by had given them glance upon disapproving glace when they passed. It was a hospital, for Christ sake, people came here when they were dying, relatives dying of boredom in sympathy was only to be expected. So he's left the deck at home ever since.

Ichigo has come to dislike hospitals. Especially their cafeterias. God, he hates those with a passion. He usually thinks himself above hating something so inane, but his patience has been tested one too many times.

Another nurse taps by, looking through a clipboard while she does, scanning the paper. They all look up, straighten a little, but she makes no move to stop, so they slump again. It's almost scary how Pavlovian a nurse flipping through a chart has become.

"You think this scan will work?" Inoue asks, her voice is quiet and Ichigo isn't sure whether or not it's the halls swallowing her voice or the miasma of the place. Chad shrugs. Ichigo rubs his eyes. Ultimately no one answers her.

The door in front of them opens and Ryuuken steps out, holding a clipboard much like his employee's, frowning while he flips through it.

All three of them perches, Ichigo has to restrain himself from standing; Ishida's only having an MRI-scan.

Ryuuken promptly ignores them, talking in low voices with the radiologist, pointing to the scan, frowning deeper. Ichigo sits back again, huffing out a breath of air. Ishida had an x-ray last week, fluoroscopy, ultrasound, several blood-tests, biopsies, CT-scans, every single test in the medical world, name it, Ishida has taken it.

It always ends the same way. Ryuuken and whatever specialist discuss the results, both frowning, always frowning, because nothing so far has told them why Ishida's dying.

Because there really isn't a nice way of putting it. For every week that goes by, he's a little skinnier, a little more exhausted and a whole lot worse for wear. His heartrates calm, his skin is dry. It seems that whatever it is, it's leeching life directly.

Ryuuken flips the chart shut and sighs, shakes his head and walks away.

Another nurse appears in the door, Ishida under her arm, guiding him to the wheelchair he arrived in.

"This is ridiculous, my legs are fine."

"Doctor's orders, Ishida-san," the nurse patiently responds and starts pushing.

"He's obviously biased," Ishida protests. Inoue, Chad and Ichigo go to follow, walking quietly next to them. Ishida's rubbing his eyes fiercely, pushing his fingers into them. Inoue looks to Ichigo and Chad, the air around her so different from Inoue's usual warmth.

"How long?" Ishida sounds strained.

He hasn't acknowledged any of them yet, but Ichigo is sure he knows they're there.

"Just another moment, Ishida-san, we're almost there," she soothes him, makes her voice soft and calm. Inoue carts a hand through his hair, keeps doing it. Ishida doesn't tense or relax, it would seem to anyone who doesn't know him that he hasn't noticed. But he's not pressing his eyes with as much urgency as before, simply covers them and breathes.

Ishida's room is dark, as close to pitch-black as they could get it. It's cool and quiet, the only noise is the IV dripping, the heartrate monitor incessant beeping; the whispers of the wind on the window and the afterthought of footsteps in the hallway. The other bed has been removed, making it seem larger, emptier. It has the feel of a chapel to it, especially when Ishida lies in the bed, unmoving, breathing shallowly.

The nurse helps him into bed, pushes the IV back in. Ishida doesn't wince when she does, practiced and perfect by now, but he sighs when she pushes a button next to the heartrate-monitor. Morphine is slowly pushed into his blood and the relief on Ishida's brow makes the room seem lighter, less tense.

The nurse writes down the dosage and lets her eyes linger on him before she turns on her heel and leaves the room.

There's a routine to these visits. If they visit while he's getting tests done, they're mostly there as support. Ishida gets a shot of morphine whenever he's been exposed to light for too long. In the beginning it had seemed a little rash to pump him full of opiates, but after hearing the first sweet sigh leave his lips, it had become an unwritten law. It makes him dull and blunt, but they grin and bear it, what else can they do?

The three of them remain standing. There's only one chair in the room, no one's bothered to fetch another and no one bothers to ask for one either. So they stand, Inoue closest, Ichigo flanked in the middle and Chad a pillar in the room, making it seem studier, less fragile.

"I don't understand why you bother," Ishida mumbles, his words slurs from the morphine, eyes closed but relaxed.

"Don't be stupid," Ichigo's the one who answers. He huffs it, puts his hands in his pockets and watches Ishida's heartrate. His own is thundering. Every time they go to see Ishida, he has to breathe deeply, has to steady himself.

"I'm assuming the lack of victory cries and general funeral mood means mine is still on."

Ishida just has a way with putting his own mortality out for laughs. It's a certain gallows humor that only he appreciates.

"Don't say that," Inoue tries smiling, but it comes out wavering, "They'll cure you."

Ishida sighs before he counters, "You couldn't."

Inoue tries laughing, she really does. Ichigo can't blame her, he doesn't think it's funny either. Chad walks to her and puts her hand on her shoulder, lets her draw on all that strength he always seems to have.

"I'd like you to leave," Ishida turns his head away, making his words even slighter, airier.

Inoue keeps her eyes down, but nods. Chad lets his arm fall away and says, "Let us know if you need anything."

They leave. Ichigo stays.

"Please?"

They've had this conversation a few times now. The first time Ichigo swore his heart was going to tear itself to pieces with Ishida's easy dismissal. The second time, he denied, spoke loudly but tensely and felt his blood pound through his veins. The third time Ishida called the nurses and had them escort him out.

Ichigo hated Ishida when he decided he wanted to be alone. He hates him because he knows Ishida's scared and the other thinks he can hide it from him.

Ishida hasn't said anything to indicate he was anything other than moderately bored with his impending death, he hasn't done anything that would lead on any kind of nervousness. But Ichigo knows. He can't see or hear it, but he knows. In the same way he knows he has ten fingers and one mouth, in the same way he knows the sky is blue and Ishida's eyes likewise.

But Ichigo isn't heartless. He sighs and goes to the door, "I'll be back tomorrow."

While closing the door he hears Ishida reply. "I know."

/

It has been four weeks since Ishida was hospitalized and it's only now, with chills and fevered eyes added to his slew of misfortune, that they ask Urahara for help.

Ishida seems completely unsurprised when Urahara states that they, with complete certainty, are dealing with some sort of aftermath of Ishida's time with the Vandenreich.

"How do we cure him?" Ryuuken asks, calm and dispassionate. He looks like he wants to call Ishida an idiot for getting involved with the Quincies in the first place, for not saying anything sooner and himself for missing something so obvious.

Everyone in the room feels the same, even Inoue seems angry with Ishida. They all thought Inoue would have been able to cure it had it been something otherworldly, but they had, bit by bit, come to realize that while Inoue could restore what once was, her powers aren't without limits.

"By implementing another source of _Reiatsu,_ " Urahara answers,"What Ishida-san is currently drawing his powers from is a contaminated source. We need to kill the Quincy in him, dry up his _Reiatsu_ and then give him a clean pool he can recover from while his own reestablishes itself."

Ishida remains quiet but frowns as Urahara explains and charts his recovery plan, he seems to have figured out the means already and it doesn't please him.

Ryuuken huffs, most likely on the same page as his son, "How do we do that?"

"The same way we always go through a crisis," Urahara chuckles behind his fan and looks to Ichigo.

To his credit, Ichigo wills himself to remain unfazed, because Urahara isn't wrong. He sometimes wonders what Soul Society did in emergencies before he showed up. _World would've ended a few times probably._ But he doesn't say it because he knows it sounds inflated with self-importance and egotism.

"Kurosaki-san has been hollowfied, his Inner Hollow may not be active, but the echo is still there. We do what we did when the Vandenreich were stealing _Bankais_ and poison Ishida-san with the trace-amount. It should be potent enough to kill off his _reiatsu_."

Ishida laughs. He honest to God laughs. "What are the chances of me surviving that?"

"Slim." Urahara answers, serious. "And if you do, we don't know if you'll retain your powers or for how long, if you'll be able to rebuild you _Reiatsu_ or if you'll live more than a few months."

Ishida just nods, his mouth twitching, "Brilliant. And Kurosaki?"

Urahara eyebrow twitches, "There's always a risk."

Ishida nods and looks away.

"When do we do this?" Ichigo leans forward, resting his weight on the bar along Ishida's bedside.

The heartrate monitor's the only sound in the room. Ishida's eyes are closed, head turned towards the covered windows.

"We don't," Ishida sighs quietly.

Ichigo tenses, "I'm sorry?"

"You heard me."

"I did, but I needed a second to process what you said. Are you serious? Ishida, you'll die if we don't –"

"And chances are I'll die if we do!" Ishida's voice hasn't been this loud in weeks. He sits up, meeting his eyes and the wind is knocked out of Ichigo's lungs, because he had forgotten what it felt like being on the opposite end of those eyes. They resemble lightning and Northern Lights and Ichigo swears, they haven't been this bright in weeks. Neither break eye contact, both staring holes in each other's foreheads. Ichigo feels Inoue touch his arm and that's when he sees the same deep sky blue flicker in his look, the one he had before he surrendered and let himself be cut down.

Ichigo clenches his teeth, knowing this is a victory he should give to Ishida, but he can't. Instead he feels his cheeks flush and his neck and shoulders prickle with goose bumps. He focuses on that instead of the steel being pushed between his eyebrows.

Ishida sighs and closes his eyes, leans back and tries breathing calmly. The insistent beeping of the monitor once again fills the space around them.

Just as Ichigo's going to chalk it up as a bitter win, Ishida says, "I made my bed and I'll sleep in it, but then I bloody well get to choose how."

There's this feeling you get before you step off a precipice, your stomach curls and petrifies, your blood screams at you but you can't hear it over the wind rushing through your hair and past you ears. If Ichigo is ever going to describe this moment to anybody, he would ask them if they had ever stepped off a cliff and leave it at that.

On their way out, Ryuuken pauses and falls in step with Ichigo, speaking softly "Can you change his mind?"

Ichigo looks over his shoulder, sees Ishida trying to uncoil his headphones, his fingers working deftly and calmly.

"I can damn well try," he says and sounds incredibly sure of himself.

Ryuuken simply nods at him, "Good luck then."

Ichigo is the last one out of the room. He catches Ishida's fingers tremble and pulling frustrated at the wires. He closes the door and goes to catch the bus home.

There's nothing so difficult as taking a leap of faith. Especially when you're in love with the person who jumps and they don't seem to care whether or not they survive the fall at all.

/

He thinks it was somewhere around December. It had been snowing, still was, light and dustlike, catching the tall sun in tiny flecks of diamond. There's something magical about Ishida in winter. He smiles to himself.

They were in the library, studying for chemistry, which he was failing. Ichigo remembers, because Ishida had looked him over before rolling his eyes, something like resignation on his brow. Ichigo had been too busy looking at the drawing of a three-headed horse Keigo had drawn on his arm to see the corner of the other's mouth lift ever so slightly.

The walk there had been silent, bordering between awkward and tense. Ichigo wanted to say something clever, something that would have Ishida asking questions, something that would lead to the two of them laughing together, smiling widely and looking away because having the other see would be too revealing. This was, and still is, something he worries about. What if they couldn't say anything important to each other? What could they possibly ever talk about that wouldn't end in an argument? Ichigo had no idea and it fucking terrified him.

He panicked and blurted out, "Lot of snow, huh?"

 _What?_ _Smooth_ , he thought to himself. _What sparkling wit, what a splendid conversationalist he was_. If he had a vertical surface, he would facepalm it a few times.

Ishida hummed, head turned slightly away. The tips of his ears were pink and his cheeks had taken a rosy hue, blending prettily with the purple bruises under his eyes. His fingers were toying with his scarf, absentmindedly picking at the threads there.

Ichigo swallowed and drummed his hand against his thigh, flailing after anything interesting to say. Anything but more weather-talk. Only those without any common ground at all talked about the weather. _What_ _if all I have in common with Ishida is the fucking weather?_ He shivered.

"Cold?" Ishida asked quickly. Ichigo shook his head, realizing too late it had been a perfect opening to expound on something, anything, ask one of those careless yet very observant questions he though Ishida would appreciate.

His heart was out of breath, telling him fight or flight was his only option. He tapped out the rhythm instead, kept his pace and looked to Ishida occasionally. He tried to keep it down, which let him to watching the sidewalk and that hadn't been nearly as interesting or aesthetically pleasing as Ishida might've been.

Seeing the library had never caused such relief or disappointment before. It was not a building Ichigo romanticized like Ishida did, a sanctuary for the lonely and all that. Ichigo had never really been lonely, not until he lost his powers and before that when the weight of the world suddenly was his burden to shoulder. He couldn't remember a time where he had been solitary by anything but his own design.

But the library did hail the end of his walk with Ishida. Which was both a liberation from tension that had been tracing their footprints in the snow, but also the end of this tête-à-tête. It was so little he ever got to talk to Ishida alone.

Ishida sniffed and began untwining his scarf before they even reached the door. There was a method to it that Ichigo felt somewhat blindsided by seeing. Ishida was many things, but human rarely seemed one of them.

Inside the library, the air was stuffy with breath, glue and books. Ishida's glasses fogged up, but he seemed unbothered, only took off his coat and placed it over his arm. Ichigo unzipped his jacket, pulled off his hat, and shoved it into his pocket. Ishida found a table by one of the tall windows and hung his coat on the back of the chair to dry, Ichigo assumed. It was black with melted snow.

A few droplets clung to Ishida's hair.

Ichigo dumped both his jacket and bag in the chair next to him and didn't bother with hanging anything. He dug out his chemistry book and his notepad, which held approximately zero entries from chemistry and his mechanical pencil.

Ishida folded his arms and leant on the table, looking out the window.

"Aren't you gonna find your stuff?" Ichigo leafed through his book, trying to seem as casual as possible, even though his heart had done nothing to seize its panicking. Feigning nonchalance was a lot more difficult than he would've thought, especially when you felt your hands tremble ever so slightly.

"I already did this part," Ishida answered, quietly, shifting his eyes to the table instead.

Ichigo wrote a useless formula in his notebook, just to have something to do. "Why're you here then?"

He knew what answer he expected and that was legions away from the one he wanted. He didn't want Ishida to leave, even though the mood was odd, to say the least. Inoue always made it seem so easy talking to Ishida. Ichigo only ever managed to get into petty September arguments with him or uphold a tense sort of civility.

And even so, there were times when they would look at each other and everything they said was subsequent to what passed then. It was so intense being the sole focus of Ishida's attention. He had an ability to make you feel like you're the only person in the room, one he didn't even seem conscious about.

It was those moments, the seconds where he was the only thing in Ishida's world that he knew Ishida was so much more than he chose to lead on.

"Inoue said you were failing chemistry."

Ichigo's first reaction was to question how on Earth Inoue would know this. Instead he shrugged and turned a page, "I was busy dealing with a power-hungry megalomaniac, takes precedent over chemistry."

Ishida snorted. Ichigo's head snapped up, probably looking wide-eyed and three different kinds of enamored. Because that was adorable.

Ichigo wasn't prone to blushing, but he felt his ears grow warm and his stomach flip. He also felt like kissing Ishida. And that was when Ichigo realized how well and truly fucked he was.

/

"You knew," Ichigo states. It's neither a question or an accusation, though he's sure it could sound that way. He's leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed. He can feel his heartbeat through his chest, can feel it marching off to battle through the thin skin of his wrist. It's odd how he would rather be anywhere else and then nowhere but here.

Ishida just breathes, like deigning Ichigo with an answer is below whatever status he has. Instead, he sinks back into his pillow and takes out his headphones. Ichigo walks over to the bed and sits down in the chair, settling in. Neither of them moves; both of them wait.

The thrumming of the equipment is the only rhythm that assures them time keeps flowing through.

"You didn't think we might've wanted to know?" Ichigo breaks the silence, shatters it more likely, because he knows he's loud in this otherwise quiet shrine to illness.

Ishida rolls his eyes and fiddling with the chords, twisting them into tight spirals. Ishida is unreadable. He always has been. There's something in the pull of his mouth that contradicts the spark in his eyes and suddenly you have no idea where right and wrong differ from yes or no. Ichigo doesn't understand Ishida, but he's adamant to try. "It wouldn't have changed anything," Ishida mutters, frowning at the tangle he's produced.

Ichigo stands abruptly, pacing the room. "It wouldn't have changed anything?"

"No, it wouldn't have changed anything!"

"I'm sorry, I thought dying was something we actively avoided doing, Ishida!" Ichigo presses. Sometimes, despite being so terribly clever, Ishida is also incredibly dumb. Ichigo wants to pull out his hair in frustration, his own or Ishida's, whichever's is unimportant. It's frustrating trying to save someone who doesn't want to be saved!

Ishida draws his legs a little closer to his chest, not much, only enough to make two small hills in his duvet. Ichigo has always loved Ishida's legs, especially when he walks with fury. There's a certain measurement and silent thunder in his pace, like the world ought to tremble at every step and thank the Gods he contains his ire. When Ishida's angry, there's something incredibly powerful to it, yet calm in the same way. Ichigo has always been slightly confounded as to how Ishida could remain stoic, especially when Ichigo himself ignites like a righteous pyre himself.

Ishida sighs, "When it's something we can actually avoid, yes, but what's the point of fighting a losing battle?"

"It's not though, is it? If you'd pull your head out of your ass, then it wouldn't be a losing battle!"

Ishida looks at him for a long time. Correction, he looks in Ichigo's direction for a long time. He's taken to avoiding eye-contact, like he thinks Ichigo can't see his hands clench and shake with a fixated dread. "Why're you being a martyr?" Ichigo adds for good measure.

"To whom? My kind will soon be extinguished forever so I doubt anybody's going to have a legitimate reason to make me one."

Ichigo's shoulders fall and he rolls his eyes. It's a shame Ishida's on his own self-made deathbed, he could've had a wonderful career writing soap operas. But Ichigo bites it back, because he knows Ishida's baiting him. It was their state of normalcy once, but he can't bring himself to answer as Ishida expect of him. Instead, he shakes his head and says, "You're more than a Quincy, Ishida."

"Am I? What am I to you if I'm not a Quincy?" Ishida bites. He takes his eyes, but only for a moment, then he lets them go again as he closes them.

"You're my friend, Ishida!" Ichigo says like it's the most obvious thing in the world, because it coincidentally is. He lets himself fall into the chair again, forcing himself to stay still instead of tapping his foot or drumming his fingers on the armrest. Ishida shakes his head and looks away from Ichigo with reopened eyes.

"Why can't you just respect my decision?"

"Because it's stupid, Ishida," Ichigo deadpans. "Like when you joined the Vandenreich, stupid."

This rewards him an eyeroll and it's good to see neither of them are willing to be grown-ups about this. Ishida sighs, "I'm sure you'd think so."

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing, besides the fact that you don't know why and you've never bothered to ask." Ishida brushes him off and puts his headphones in before Ichigo even gets a chance to respond. Ichigo shakes his head and goes to stand.

"I'll make sure to bother next time I request an audience. Asshole."

"I heard that." Ishida states without missing a beat.

Ichigo wants to wring his skinny, pasty neck but he also wants to kiss the living daylights out of him. And that's the worst part about being in love with an arrogant piece of shit like Ishida. You never really know where you stand on the love/hate spectrum and you certainly don't know what will kill you first.

There's no light in Ishida's room besides the white-blue light from his iPod, diligently pressed into the duvet to choke out as much of the glare as possible. Ichigo leaves Ishida to his audiobooks or his music or his podcasts or whatever it is he's listening to. He squeezes through the door, avoiding opening it too much.

"Asshole," he says again for good measure, though this time it's a good deal more dejected as well.

/

If December is the time he realizes he wants to kiss Ishida, September is the month he first becomes aware something's amiss.

Ichigo is not usually prone to ponder his emotions even though Rukia keeps saying it's good for his mental health. He has found it's sometimes just easier to roll with whatever and not question whatever that might be. In September, however, he realizes that something fishy is going on with Ishida. Not with Ishida, but with _him_ and Ishida.

There once was this odd charge in the air between them and it has grown docile over the years, like a lion that had grown amorous to its captors. One day it's back with vengeance. They react as would be expected. Ichigo pulls Ishida's pigtails and suddenly the other's at his throat and Ichigo had forgotten how great it is to see Ishida lose his composure and throw every and all worries about public image to the wind.

It becomes somewhat of a habit after that.

He prods Ishida, makes sure he cracks his knuckles and chews his pencil and lets his restless leg go wild, all to get Ishida to turn to him and viciously hiss at him to _stop that, please!_ and then of course doing no such thing. When the bell rings, Ishida's so tightly wound you could bounce coins off his shoulders. After that, they're off again.

Chad just watches them argue about every petty thing Ichigo can think to throw in Ishida's face. Inoue attempted to stop him the first few times, only to find they can't be bothered to do so. It has become his favorite drug this, pestering Ishida into complete disarray. The fire in his eyes and the explosiveness of his gestures as well as the smug look he'll get when he thwarts Ichigo.

And sometimes he just sighs and lets his head fall back. "Why do you keep provoking me?" he'll ask and Ichigo honestly has no clue himself, besides to say _it's the highlight of my day,_ he does instead counter it with another question, "Why do you keep falling for it?" It takes no less than one second before Ishida's snarling at him again.

Inoue has taken to leaving the room or covering her ears until the worst of it is over. He doesn't blame her. They pick at old scars, tears off scabs and pour saltwater in every visible wound. And sure, it hurts when Ishida lands a cutting remark about his inability to protect them all, and he thinks he sees Ishida wince when he mentions his grandfather. There's nothing holy then, nothing is sacred and suddenly they're out of breath and just looking at each other.

Chad levels him with several looks and very few of them are approving of what he's doing. But to be fair, Ishida doesn't seem to mind all that much. He enjoys the war just as much as Ichigo, if the small smile that accompanies his taunts is anything to go by. They both feel it, the heart rushing and maybe it's because they're fundamentally different people than Chad and Inoue are. Chad is a defender, Inoue is a healer, but Ishida and Ichigo are bows and swords, they attack and bathe in blood for sport.

There's a certain serenity to the time immediately after. That is, until Ichigo lets the mission commence and suddenly Ishida's blood pressure can be heard again. Or maybe Ichigo dreams up the rather fervent beat to underscore their show-offs.

It all changes one day in October where he and Chad are walking to Urahara's Store.

"Why do you keep baiting Ishida like that?" Chad asks.

Ichigo makes a face and shrugs, "Laughs, I guess."

Chad gives him a long, almost searching look as he's trying to figure out if Ichigo means what he's saying. Ichigo stands his ground though and takes a swig of his waterbottle. "Why?"

"Ishida asked me if I knew."

"He noticed?"

"I know, strange," Chad deadpanned. He thought he was so funny when he played at sarcasm. The problem was that very few people could tell when Chad was being sarcastic or not, so really, it was a double-edged sword that. Ichigo could though, but only because only ever did it to him when he thought he was being stupid.

Ichigo groaned, "Fine."

"So why do you do it?"

"I don't know? It's good stress-relief."

"You're very hard on each other for this being stress-relief."

Chad had this way of looking through your skull, looking through it at fishing out exactly what you need to hear. Uncanny though it was.

"Maybe you should figure out why you do that. Instigate him, I mean. If not for his sake, then for Inoue's."

They turn around the corner and walk down the graveled path that leads to the store. The weather was angry that day, grey and purple clouds trudging over the sky, stomping their feet to get their point across.

"What about Inoue?"

"Just leave him alone, Ichigo."

They stop outside so Chad can have a smoke. He lights his cigarette with habit and nicotine staining his fingers. Ichigo's frowning, wondering why exactly Inoue had to be dragged into this.

It starts raining before Chad finishes his smoke. He crushes it under his shoe and gives Ichigo a final pointed look and they enter the store.

Ichigo leaves Ishida alone after that.

/

They're sitting around a table, stabbing at the color- and tasteless food they've purchased in the hospital's cafeteria. Ichigo really has no idea why they keep letting themselves be fooled. Since the first time they ate lunch here, Ichigo has sworn he'd never eat here again. It's ridiculous.

"This is ridiculous." Ichigo plants his chopsticks in the dry mountain of rice, unsurprised that they remain erected.

"We really should learn from past mistakes," Chad agrees, but Ichigo shakes his head, because they've misunderstood him. "I'm talking about Ishida."

Inoue looks up, eyes huge, they're always huge, but somehow they seem even more apprehensive than usual.

"It pisses me off that he won't even give it a shot," Ichigo complains and watches Inoue smile a quiet half-smile.

Chad shrugs, "It's his decision."

"That doesn't make it a good choice."

"But we still have to respect it, Ichigo," Chad argues and takes a sip of his coffee and Ichigo is thoroughly impressed that he doesn't make a face at the taste. Inoue fiddles with her tempura, tries to drown out the nothingness with soy, but it has backfired and now all her food is drenched in it. She doesn't even like soy, and Ichigo thinks that speaks volume about the quality of the flavors in front of them. She gives up, doing what both Ichigo and Chad did after the first few bites. It doesn't take more before you convince yourself you're full, really.

Ichigo's leg's jumping up and down, rabid and impatient. Visiting hours officially starts in about half an hour's time. When Ishida was first brought here, they had found themselves sitting at the same table as now, ten minutes past midnight, exhausted and worried out of their minds. The cafeteria had been closed, visiting hours had been over hours ago, but they couldn't leave. They hadn't talked. Ichigo's leg had been jumping, just like now, Chad had been leaning on his elbows, some of his usual strength crumbling away and Inoue had been draped across the tabletop, eyes heavy and hair flowing down her back and over the edge.

It wasn't until the cleaning crew had asked them to leave, polite but firm, that they had vacated the premises. The next day they were back. Without scheduling, calling beforehand or discussing it prior till then, they met each other at the same table at 9 o'clock on a Saturday and ordered coffee and breakfast, sampling what would become a tradition in the future.

And nice as it was meeting up with Inoue and Chad for breakfast every Saturday, it would be preferable if they could do it somewhere besides this infernal cafeteria with their subpar food and grimy coffee, but even nicer if Ishida was with them.

There's almost a physical hole in their conversations without him, in the space next to them. Ishida brings a certain sharpness, but also a calm with him. He isn't an extrovert like Ichigo and doesn't contribute with the same thrumming and fire; Ishida's a fresh summer-breeze in a heatwave, the hand that holds the string of a balloon lest it fly away.

Chad's remains the foundation, Ishida's holds them grounded, Ichigo's drives them forwards and Inoue's the air in their lungs.

Ichigo holds his head in his hands and sighs, digging the heels of his palms into his eyes. He stays like that and breathes.

"Is it because it's me?" he asks with a small voice that doesn't fit him. "I mean, sure, it's his life, but he acts like we wouldn't care about him dying."

"Perhaps you should ask Ishida about this," Chad replies, an undertone in his answer makes Ichigo look up. Chad doesn't use that tone unless there's something he wants Ichigo to realize.

"Okay, what? What am I missing?" Ichigo leans back and tips the chair back on it's hind legs. Inoue's watching him with a hint of worry, but she needn't. They're at a hospital, if there's any place you'd want to injure yourself, it would be a hospital.

Chad scratches his cheeks and Ichigo can already hear his stubble. "I think you're exaggerating your role in this."

Ichigo lets his eyes drop to the table, pushes the chair back on all four and pillows his head in his arms. His scowl is fierce and definitely what has Inoue looking to Chad.

"So, is anyone going to the Spring-dance?" Inoue asks, trying her hardest to diffuse the dark-gray clouds over Ichigo's head. "Who're you bringing, Sado-kun?"

Her cheer, admirable as it is, is also grating right now. Ichigo's not interested in them moping along with him, he generally prefer the people around him smiling and happy, but he can't figure out how they possibly can when Ishida's lying to floors up, most likely never stepping off the lot if he gets his way.

"There's plenty of assholes out there, why did I have to fall for Ishida?" he mumbles into the very bones of his body, hoping that saying it out loud will earn him and answer.

Quiet descends upon the table. Suddenly he hears Inoue incoherently making her excuses and pushing her chair away from the table. Ichigo lifts his head and looks after her as she walks towards the exit. He calls out for her, but she only waves in response.

He whips around to Chad, about to ask him what's happening, but Chad beats him to it. "You should go after her, I think."

Ichigo kicks back from their table, leaving his stuff with Chad and hurries after Inoue. She doesn't have much more than a few seconds on him.

He finds her at the bus stop, furiously wiping her eyes when she sees him. She keeps them down, clutching her bag in front of her. Ichigo walks up to her and sits down on the bench. It smells like cigarettes and smog, butts lying everywhere and candy-wrappers littering the ground beside them.

Inoue remains standing a few feet ahead of him, "I'm sorry, Kurosaki-kun, I didn't mean to …" she trails off before she finishes. Ichigo rests his elbows on his knees, leaning forward and picking at his fingers.

"Was it something I said?" he tries.

She doesn't answer. The bus comes into sight around the hill, climbing slowly. Inoue doesn't move and the passengers, boyfriends, girlfriends, mothers, fathers, children, friends jump off the bus, arriving with flowers and stuffed animals. There's a few minutes to visiting hours still. Inoue is rooted to the place, she doesn't get on the bus.

"You can be so stupid, Kurosaki-kun," she exclaims, it's broken, but it also sounds giddy. Like she's wanted to say all these things for such a long time and finally found the time to say it. She's smiling when she turns, but it's the same weird contraption she displays when they're with Ishida. The corners of her mouth are constantly veering downwards, she lets them, but only for a second, then she regains her composure.

"I'm in love with you." She meets his eyes directly. He's frozen in place, he knows that whatever she needs to say is important.

And even though Inoue is spilling her heart to him, he can't help but wish it was Ishida standing in front of him now, telling him those exact words.

"I've been in love with you for the past four years, Kurosaki-kun! And never once did you consider that." She walks over and sits down next to him. "At first I thought you might've been in love with Kuchiki-san."

He sits back with her and watches a few cars drive in and park the car, a young man hurrying out the car and opening the door for his pregnant wife and holding it open for her while he helps her out. Ichigo turns to watch Inoue. She sits and watches them with a wistfulness he can't recognize from himself. The couple strolls inside, smiling at each other like only they know the secret to a happy life.

"How long?" she questions him then and pushes her hair behind her ears. It practically glows in the timid spring sun, illuminating the tracks down her cheeks.

Ichigo takes a deep breath, "September."

She turns to him abruptly and stares at him, tears still peaking from the corners of her eyes and in the tips of her eyelashes. She looks to the hospital, somewhat in the direction in where Ishida is. Ishida is the fourth window from the right, three stories up. You can tell because the heavy grey curtains are drawn.

"He doesn't know," he tells her before she asks him.

Inoue watches him only a second longer before she reaches out and hugs him. He puts her arms around her and closes his eyes. Inoue has an ability to make people around her feel better, simply by being near them. She that first blossom on a cherry-tree that blooms in spring.

He forgets he's sitting on a cold metal-bench, that he's made her miserable for the past four years, that he's been miserable since September, that Ishida's dying and won't let Ichigo help him. He lets Inoue's warmth wash over him and relaxes into it, holds her a little tighter than usual and swallows. What is it they say? Misery loves company.

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault, Kurosaki-kun. You're not good at reading other people and you suck at telling people how you feel. It's okay, I knew that."

She pulls back a little, "Why haven't you told him?"

"What good could that possibly do?"

Inoue turns her head towards the road and catches a glimpse of the bus returning, once again climbing the hill. "You never know." Inoue stands and brushes a hand through his hair, but snatches it away before he can say anything to her. She hops onto the bus, waves at him, but turns away again. He waves anyways and leans back into the seat.

"Fuck," he says.

/

It's Monday before Ichigo visits Ishida again.

He had gone back inside and Chad had taken one look at him before giving him his stuff and telling him to go home, he'd let Ishida know he and Inoue weren't coming today.

"I'm sure he won't be that disappointed," Ichigo had said and earned himself a reproachful look from Chad, before he shook his head and sent him on his way.

He'd spent most of Sunday watching TV trying not to retrace every single conversation with Inoue, every single thing she'd done, that he'd done over the past four years. It only had him wallowing in disbelief and shame.

Karin had frowned, but sat down next to him and changed the channel. They'd spent the rest of the afternoon watching a Visions of Escaflowne marathon. Yuzu had also joined them when she'd come back from a study-date with a friend, leaning her head on Ichigo's shoulder and giggling softly at all the physical humor. Karin would snort, but he knew she enjoyed it too.

He's alone this time. Inoue had stopped by Sunday and Chad had work this afternoon.

The elevator ride fills him with a strange sort of dread and it doesn't make sense, because he hasn't done anything wrong. But he can't pretend that it's all well and good, mostly because it isn't. If they lived in a perfect world, he would've been in love with Inoue and Ishida could have his way and wither out of existence if that's what he wanted to do.

Ichigo leans his forehead on the cold walls and sighs.

The numbers crawl upwards along with the elevator, his hands tightening and his temples thumping. When he reaches the third floor, he can feel his blood boil and his heart pump, but not the way it usually does when he's about to see Ishida. He's angry and he has no idea why that's his default emotion. He takes a deep breath, then another three, before he opens the door.

Nothing has changed inside. It's eerie how much it's already like a mausoleum in here. For the first time Ichigo notices that there's no flowers, no stuffed animals, no personal touches, no reminders that Ishida's loved and appreciated.

He falters.

"Could you please hurry inside and shut the door after you?" Ishida groans from the bed. Ichigo closes the door quietly, but stays by it. He doesn't know why but he can't bring himself to go to Ishida. He leans against the door instead and watches as Ishida drags his head towards him and watches him sharply. If he thinks it's strange Ichigo doesn't come closer, he doesn't show it.

"If you've come to preach about my decision, you can leave again." Ishida doesn't even seem to realize Ichigo sucks in a breath. If he wasn't already backed up against a door, he would take a step back, only to get some distance between them. It hurts. It really does. _It's always nice to know you're wanted._

"Fuck you, Ishida," Ichigo huffs, and shakes his head. He doesn't rise to the bait, and that gets Ishida's attention it seems.

Ishida frowns and sits up, slowly and apprehensive, "Are you okay?"

If Ichigo didn't know better, he'd say Ishida looks worried. Instead, he lets himself slide down to the floor, his head falls back and he draws his legs closer and crosses them.

"Define okay."

Ishida waits him out. He turns off his iPod and bunches the earplugs around it, putting it on the table next to the bed. He adjusts his body so he's more comfortable and then turns towards Ichigo again.

And suddenly it's only the two of them. There's no nurses trailing the halls outside, there's no patients moaning through the walls and no visitors asking thinly veiled, yet hopeful questions. The world is silent, the heart in Ichigo's chest beats steadily if a little nervous, and his arms drape themselves in gooseflesh. Ichigo shakes his head again and Ishida only watches him.

"Inoue's in love with me," he says at last.

"Well, yeah."

"Did everybody know but me?" Ichigo demands and gestures weakly, a mere accent of what he'd normally do.

"She wasn't exactly subtle," Ishida deadpans, "and you weren't exactly paying attention."

"But you were?" Ichigo feels his throat constrict, making it harder to breathe.

Ishida shrugs, "I generally pay more attention to my surroundings than you do. What's the problem? Inoue's a sweet girl, you could do worse than her."

Ichigo doesn't answer. He returns Ishida's gaze, but no more. He'd meant it when he'd said he believed it wouldn't make a difference to Ishida.

"But you don't reciprocate her feelings." Ishida comes to the right conclusion without Ichigo helping him. He sounds the tiniest bit breathless and that has Ichigo's stomach dropping to the ground.

"Didn't the others tell you?" Ichigo asks, mostly because he needs to say something.

Ishida slides his bangs away from his eyes and Ichigo has to forcibly remember how to breathe. Ishida's eyes are gorgeous and it's always been a strange sort of privilege seeing them in all their blue splendor. There's always an underlying note of scrutiny in his eyes, like he's judging you. Ichigo's learned it's not judgment that follows as much as it is acceptance of those things he sees. But there's a hint of sadness there and Ichigo wants to whisk it away immediately, returning that usual starlight to his eyes.

"No."

Ichigo barely catches it. Ishida looks almost crestfallen, looking away, "They don't …" He trails of, looks to the windows and then to the IV dripping steadily above him.

"What do you talk about then? I mean, I try and knock some bloody sense into you," that earns him a glare, "what do Inoue and Chad do? Am I doing all this psychological warfare alone?" he jokes, hoping Ishida will lose that February shine to his eyes.

Ishida giggles and Ichigo positively melts at the sound. It's so very rare hearing Ishida do anything but snort. Ichigo is not sure if it's the isolation or his rusty comical sense. He knows he's not the most humoristic of their friends, he rarely laughs and scowls most of the time, but the way Ishida's still smiling, has him mirroring the gesture and he relaxes a little further into the door.

"Inoue-san likes to pretend you're going to win your war. Sado-kun and I mostly talk about you two and how unfair you're being. Or I talk about that and Sado-kun listens."

"I don't like you giving up like this," Ichigo says.

Ishida turns stony and gives him a hard look, "I don't like you judging me every time you're here," a beat. "I don't like the three of you talking about me behind my back." Ishida's voice is flint and glass, he says it with such finality and such unrepentant cold.

Ichigo looks down, "I'm sorry."

"No, you're not."

Ichigo nods and goes to stand, "I'll leave if you want me to."

"I don't," Ishida says. "I like having someone here, it gets …"

And Ichigo understands what he means. Looking around the room and nothing in here gives away that there's a world outside the door at Ichigo's back. That there's life outside this room. Ishida's confined in his own space every day, all day with nothing but his iPod and a blackened window.

"Why did you join the Vandenreich?" Ichigo asks then, hoping it will prove a more natural matter of conversation.

"Speaking of nothing," Ishida retorts and looks a little affronted. Ichigo walks over to him, his hands buried deep in his pockets and dumps down in the chair, toeing off his shoes and resting them on the bed, inches away from Ishida. "I promised I'd ask you last time."

Ishida looks to his feet and then back to his face, "Make yourself at home."

"The Vandenreich," Ichigo persists and nudges him with his feet.

He sighs and rubs his eyes, fingers fidgeting with duvet, picking at loose threads, "Have you ever wanted to belong somewhere?"

"I belong here," Ichigo answers without hesitation.

"I mean, spiritually," Ishida amends. "Haven't you ever wondered what it would be like if you found someone who understood everything you've been going through because they've been there themselves, because they're your kin?"

He looks almost desperate for Ichigo to get his point. Ichigo thinks it through. It seems important to Ishida, it's the least he can do, really. He shakes his head, "I have you."

"We don't count, we're not Substitute Soul Reapers," Ishida counters. _Singular, Ishida. You in singular,_ he wants to say, but he's afraid that might be a tad too revealing and that's not a can of worms he's ready to open in front of Ishida.

"No, I mean –"

"I know what you mean, Ishida," Ichigo interrupts before repeats himself.

"Then you understand," he looks a strange mix of relieved, anxious and hopeful.

Ichigo wriggles his toes under the duvet. It isn't chilly in the room, it's warm, comfortably so, but it's an excuse as good as any. "I really don't. I know what you mean, but it doesn't make sense to me why you just abandoned us for that."

Ishida sighs, "Forget it, it doesn't matter."

They remain quiet. Ichigo can't find anything to say that isn't treading thin ice and Ishida seems disinclined to converse at the moment. It reminds him of a snowy walk once upon a time in December. They stay in each other's silence, but not uncomfortably so.

After 20 minutes it gets to him though and he nods towards the iPod, "What're you listening to?"

Ishida looks startled for a moment before he looks and picks it up, handing one of them to Ichigo. Ichigo takes it and moves closer. Ishida turns it on, squinting, covering the screen and pressing play.

" … Thus Aragorn for the first time in the full light of day beheld Éowyn, Lady of Rohan, and thought her fair, fair and cold, like a morning of pale spring that is not yet come to womanhood. And she was now suddenly aware of him: tall heir of kings, wise with many winters, greycloaked, hiding a power that yet she felt. For a moment still as stone she stood, then turning swiftly she was gone …"

They spend the rest of the visiting hours listening to Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers on Ishida's iPod. Ishida shifts a little closer because the earbuds keep falling out of their ears. They're mere inches apart and this is the happiest Ichigo has been since November.

/

He speaks very little with Inoue. Chad assures him she's not upset with him, only that she needs time.

Instead he sits with Ishida, listening to audiobooks, podcasts, music, the silence. Sometimes they talk. It's mostly Ichigo who does the talking. Ishida had given him a withering look when he'd asked him about his day.

"I've been here. Yesterday someone changed my IV, quite the thrill."

Ichigo chuckled and earned himself another glare.

Now, Ichigo talks about classes, about his friends ( _their_ friends but Ishida's still an asshole about it), about his family, about the world outside. There was a Hollow in the park the other day, they've repainted the old factory to make it look less trashy, someone spray-painted a proposal on the side of an apartment building. 7eleven began serving tempura last week, the mall had to close because someone had vandalized the lingerie-shops, the old lady on 5th Block had set her house on fire and someone had handed out flowers for the anniversary of Fukushima.

Ishida listens to everything he has to say. Even when he tells anecdotes completely unrelated to the matter of conversation. Ichigo tells him about his dad, his sisters, his mother; Ishida reciprocates by telling him about Ryuuken, his grandfather and his own mother.

They form a strange sort of truce in those moments. They have given each other loaded guns now and trust the other not to use it. It reminded Ichigo of an artpiece he'd heard of, where a man held the bowstring and the woman, in front of him, held the bow itself, leaning back and drawing. The arrow pointed straight at her and if either of them let go she would die. He told Ishida and the other had looked at him with an odd edge of absolution.

Ichigo has taken to heading there after school and doing his homework with Ishida. It doesn't feel as if he's been out of school for the past two months. It's with the same practiced ease he rolls his eyes and shakes his head when Ichigo takes a shot in the dark regarding the answer. Ishida seems to appreciate it.

He never says as much, but the small smile at his lips is confirmation enough.

Today, he's brought his algebra. He doesn't have too hard of a time with it, but he knows Ishida enjoys math an so he folds. It's almost like running into a wall made of heat when he opens the door to Ishida's room. The bed is empty, the linen is thrown on the floor, flooding the tiles.

Ichigo throws his bag in the corner and goes to check behind the bed. It wouldn't be the first time Ishida fell out of it. It had been hilarious, but Ichigo had made a solemn vow not to bring it up until they were a few years away from this, because Ishida's as prickly as ever about his pride, refusing catheter and bedpans, insisting his legs still work perfectly fine and the exercise does him well. By exercise, he means waddling, because even though he tries hiding it, Ichigo can see his knees shaking, the few meters to the bathroom and back again.

Ichigo chokes down a smile.

"Ishida?" he calls out.

There's no answer. Ichigo frowns. It's odd, Ishida usually tells him the day before if he has any "exciting plans", such as, but not limited to the changing of his sheets, an ophthalmic-reexamination or physical therapy. He hears the shower running and goes to the bathroom door, knocks and waits for an answer. When he doesn't get one, he opens the door slowly, leaving Ishida ample opportunity to shriek at his bad manners, but he's met with nothing of the sort. Steam billows out, the room has the same humidity as a rainforest. It swirls around his feet and he feels soaked with sweat already. It's black as sin inside.

"Ishida?" he asks again.

"Go away," he mutters.

Ichigo, never having been one for obeying such demands, closes the door, turns on the flashlight in his phone as not to trip and fall over the toilet, and walks over next to the shower. The white plastic-curtain is more or less opaque, but Ishida is still visible behind it. He's sitting on the floor, quite naked it would seem.

And Ichigo has to get a grip, because it's not like Ishida's equipped with anything he isn't, but he still finds himself blushing fiercely. He sits down on the floor and knocks on the curtain.

"Ishida? You okay?"

"Go away, I said!"

Ichigo rolls his eyes and gets up. Then he pulls the curtain aside and steps in. Ishida looks stricken and completely confounded about this development. He draws his legs and little closer and tightens his arms hold around himself. If it wasn't because the room and the water was almost scalding hot, Ichigo would think Ishida's embarrassed. Ichigo has to concentrate about not letting his gaze drop further down than Ishida's collarbone. The struggle is real.

He turns of the light with fumbling movements as Ishida winces and hisses.

"What're you doing?" Ishida asks weakly as Ichigo sits down next to him at the edge of the spray, his clothes drenching slowly, his hair and fabric plastering to his body. His school shirt is practically see-through and his pants are darker than midnight. Or he assumes this seeing as the only source of light was banished.

He looks to Ishida who seems to have loosened up and relaxed a bit, "So what's wrong?"

"I'm sorry, can't I take a long shower without having an internal meltdown?"

"You snapped at me."

"You barged into my shower," Ishida snaps again and turns his head away.

Ichigo lifts an eyebrow, "I've been bestowed the same equipment as you, naked doesn't bother me."

 _That might be embellishing the truth, but whatever._

"Well, it bothers me, Kurosaki," Ishida grumbles and sounds every bit the petulant teenager they both ought to be.

Ichigo laughs and looks straight ahead instead. Ishida leans his head on the wall.

"This is honestly one of the weirdest conversations I've ever had. And I talk to Keigo on a daily basis," Ichigo tries and tilts his head towards Ishida, letting his eyes follow. It's dark and impossible to see anything, which is rather fortunate as he's sitting next to Ishida who happens to be appropriately dressed for a shower.

Ishida doesn't reply, but stays close to the wall.

"Why're you in the shower?" he questions, serious this time, because as insistent as Ishida may be, he's easy to read like this.

Ishida sighs, "Maybe I was just taking a shower."

"And maybe I'm an opera singer."

He's about 90% sure that if he could see Ishida, he would be glaring daggers.

Ichigo raises an eyebrow, "Don't do that. I call you bullshit, have the curtesy to own up to it."

"How do you know what I'm doing?"

"Ishida," he says, stern and somewhat demanding.

Ishida's quiet for a while, he doesn't say anything and if he does, it's drowned out by the constant flow of water from above them. It reminds Ichigo of a rainstorm in November, it was also heavy and insistent.

"I'm cold."

"I'm sorry, what?"

"I tried taking a hot shower, but I'm still freezing cold. I can't sleep and I'm just so tired and I thought a shower would help, but it hasn't, I'm still cold and I'm still tired and I wanna go home."

Ichigo hears the break in his voice but doesn't comment. It makes his heart curl into itself hearing Ishida sounding so utterly miserable, rasping and slurring the tips of the words. He swallows and looks away, even though it matters so very little here in the dark. If Ishida's crying he won't hear it because of the water already falling.

Dealing with an emotional Ishida is not his field of expertise. As a matter of fact, it's happened exactly never, which makes him feel wrong-footed and awkward. He tries to remember anything useful, but all that comes to mind is how helpful it would be to have Inoue right about now. She was always the better caretaker, the better giver. But he's on his own and that will have to do.

Ishida hiccups next to him and Ichigo takes a deep breath, without knowing why, and says, "I'll go fix your bed."

He goes to stand when he hears Ishida, ever so faintly reply, "Okay."

Ichigo tugs off his pants, soaked now, and pulls off his shirt, a few seems ripping and stretching uncomfortably. He drops them on the floor, considers himself for a moment before he takes off his underwear too. He doesn't want a cold because he was being a prude, and he really doesn't mind naked when he himself can't even see his junk.

"What're you doing?" Ishida drawls.

Ichigo almost bangs his elbow into the door in his valiant attempt to remove his socks. It cannot be done gracefully, he's come to accept this, but it surprises him how much more coordinated it has to be in the black like this. "Undressing," he struggles and finally throws them on the ground with a wet smack.

"Why?"

"I'm drenched, I don't want a cold." He closes the curtain between them. The damage is already done, the floor and the toilet is slippery wet.

Ishida starts sentences, only to retrace his steps and trying again. Ichigo saves him at the fifth attempt and takes pity, "I have gym clothes, it won't be today you get to bask in my naked glory."

"More's the pity," Ishida deadpans, sounding a little more alive than before.

Ichigo moves to the door and slowly pushes down the handle, letting Ishida know he was leaving. He grabs a towel before he goes out and closes behind him. He dries himself off with quick efficiency, goes to his backpack, and finds his shorts and t-shirt. He leaves the towel over his head, leaving it to absorb. His hair may be short, but it's deceptively thick and takes longer to dry than you'd expect.

He starts putting the sheet back on the bed, wondering why Ishida ripped it off in the first place. It's damp to the touch so Ichigo decides against it, throwing it on the floor again. The same goes for the pillow and the duvet, both are clammy and cold and Ichigo simply piles it with the sheet. There's a linen closet further down the corridor, manned by nurses and cleaning crew.

Ichigo gathers the dirty laundry and goes to exchange it. The nurse there gives him a onceover, frowning as she takes the linen from him.

"Where's this from?"

"307," Ichigo answers and looks to the other nurses who quickly turn away and giggle behind their hands. He waves, smiles at them and they get another fit. The first, rather matronly nurse, returns with clean sheets.

"If he needs anything else, let me know." She looks concerned and nods as she writes down that 307 received another pack of linen.

"I will," Ichigo says and lifts his hand in silent goodbye as she shoos him out of her kingdom of cotton and white.

His feet are cold and make a sticky sound against the tiles as he walks back to Ishida's room. He knocks, not wanting to intrude upon Ishida's modesty again but gets no answer like before. He lets himself inside and shuts the door with a kick.

It takes another ten minutes before the sheets are on the bed and another five before he's wrestled the duvet back into it's cover and he finishes with plopping the pillow, covered and all, back against the headboard.

He gets his phone from his backpack and plays a few rounds of Angry Birds, getting comfortable in Ishida's bed, warming it up, warming his own feet in the process. After trying and retrying the 31st level he hears the door to the bathroom swing open.

"Kurosaki?" he calls and Ichigo hums, failing for the umpteenth time and closes the game.

"You're still here." It's not a question, it sounds a little discouraged as if Ishida had hoped he would've left.

"That I am."

"My clothes are in the closet."

Ichigo has to admit he isn't quite sure what Ishida wants to communicate with that statement. _Am I getting his clothes? Am I to know this for future reference?_

"Okay?" is the most eloquent reply he can formulate and so, he's sure, disappointing Ishida once more with his lack of conversational abilities.

"I have to get it."

"I suppose so."

"You stole my towel."

Ichigo hums, his mouth pinching.

"I'm naked."

"Yes," Ichigo frowns. It could be regarded as both a question and a statement this.

"Well, then, look away."

 _Oh._

"Ishida, I told you, it's not like we're equipped differently, I don't mind."

"And I told you, I do. Could you please just look away."

Ichigo rolls his eyes but ultimately does.

"Are you doing it?"

"Yes, your purity is safe."

"Shut up," Ishida bites and walks across the floor. Ichigo opens Angry Birds again; fuck if he's going to get flamed because he saw Ishida's ass. Or his back. Or his legs. Or his chest. _Okay, this took a turn for the worse._

His 18 year old body has a mind and a libido of it's own, most of the time it was a welcome stress-relief, but getting a boner in his gym shorts while Ishida's in the same room's incredibly low on his list of priorities.

"Are you done soon?" He tries making it sound annoyed, but it comes out wavering. He sounds nervous.

"Shut up!" Ishida repeats.

Ichigo, by some miracle from above, manages to beat both the 31st level of Angry Birds and suppress his unwanted erection in the time Ishida gets dressed. And honestly, how long can it take to put on a pair of yoga-pants and an unflattering t-shirt of the hospitals make and mark?

"Move over," Ishida demands.

Ichigo barely gets times to either turn or move before Ishida worms under the duvet. He's radiating cold and almost feels like winter before the first tide of March.

"Holy shit, you're freezing!"

Ishida hooks himself back up to every machine he's been tethered to thus far. He does it with ease and practice and Ichigo assumes he's had some, considering how long he's been here by now. He would offer his assistance, but it's not exactly what he's been helping out with at the clinic.

"I told you," he mumbles, petulant again and paws after his iPod. Automatically he offers Ichigo one of the earbuds. He takes it. And even though he should be reading his English homework, he really can't be bothered. Ishida presses play, managing now without looking at the screen at all and the narrator begins talking.

Ishida has buried himself under the duvet, his nose not yet submerged. Ichigo thinks it's almost disgustingly hot in the room, so he keeps only his legs under, also sitting with the pillow at his back against the headboard. It's comfortable. Like summer or dinner with your family in the garden.

"It's warmer," Ishida comments after a while. Under the duvet, he raises a hand and touches Ichigo's arm, almost sighing as he does. "You're warmer."

Ichigo has to swallow hard. It makes his hairs stand and a sweeping feeling goes through his body. The touch was nothing but four, ice-cold fingertips on his forearm, but he feels himself shiver and cool along with it.

What's worse is, that Ishida keeps his fingers there. _God is dead. Nietzsche was right._

Ichigo is stiff and tense now. He doesn't want to move and upset Ishida, but he really isn't equipped to handle this. And yes, they've touched before, but never like this, never this intimate. However innocent is may seem to the world at large, Ichigo almost feels naked again, this time both physically and mentally.

It feels like hours until there's a knocking on the door and a nurse bearing a tray of food enters. She looks young and sweet, a row of piercings in her ears and Ichigo approves of her method of rebellion.

"Ishida-san, dinner time," she announces and takes one look at Ichigo and gets a stern expression, much unlike the delicate tone of voice she was using before.

"What're you doing here? Visiting hours are over," she berates, putting down the tray.

Ichigo must look sufficiently stricken, because her eyes soften and she sighs. "If you were anybody else, my friend, I would've kicked you out personally."

Ichigo has no idea what that's supposed to mean. Maybe Ryuuken warned them in advance and told the staff he could stay. Maybe his picture is in their lounge.

Kind of like the picture the Seiyu distributed after Keigo had talked him into joining his political happening. They had pinned faces of a politician calling for assimilation on the mannequins and had been banned from the store for two years. Keigo never shopped in Seiyu, but the Kurosaki-family did and Isshin had looked very confused when Ichigo had been escorted out of there by security the next time they went. Yuzu had eyed him disapprovingly while Karin had given him a surreptitious low five. Needless to say, he wasn't allowed to go shopping with them anymore. Which also meant he never got the right shampoo or cereal, so his usual tissue-and-lube run had been expanded to tissue-and-lube-and-whatever-wasn't-bought-the-first-time-around run.

 _Fuck Keigo and his persuasiveness._

The nurse swings the table over the bed, the tray there and a glass of water beside it. The food looks suspiciously much like the stuff they serve in the cafeteria. Ichigo frowns and narrows his eyes. _We meet again._

She leaves them, but points two fingers from her eyes to him and back. Ichigo is unsure of how to react to that, so he nudges Ishida instead, who grumbles, but sits up. He looks about as unimpressed as Ichigo is.

"Want to share?" Ishida pokes the nikujaka with the chopsticks. The stew looks stuffy and boring, like old furniture.

Ichigo presses his lips together, "You eat this every day?"

"Sometimes it's imoni."

"I don't see how that's better."

Ishida shrugs and leans back against the headboard. "I'm not hungry."

"I'm starving," Ichigo states, but is not roused by the dish in front of him. Ishida eyes him slowly.

"Why don't you eat it then?"

"Please, the Russian Gulags had better food."

"I won't argue with that."

"Will miracles ever cease?"

Ishida gives a mocking laugh, but gesticulates angrily at the food, "What do you suggest then? Kita-san doesn't take no for an answer?"

Ichigo frowns, "Who's Kita-san?"

"She was literally just here." And God, Ichigo has happily forgotten how much of an asshole Ishida can still be when the mood strikes.

"I'm sorry, I don't have the name of every single staff-member down yet." Ichigo rolls his eyes and feels juvenile for doing so, but he has found it expresses his frustration rather eloquently. Honestly, he didn't remember Ishida's name the first time around, he can't possibly expect him to remember a nurse he might have not have seen at all.

Ishida crosses his arms, "You're right, what was I thinking? It's only been two months and not likely to be much longer."

"You're the only one insisting on that, Ishida."

If Ichigo was a better person he wouldn't rise to the bait and he would leave well alone. But at times like these, he isn't. He remembers November rain and September sun and lets that flavor his words.

"As you so often remind me. Isn't it nice looking down on everyone from the moral high-ground?"

"I wouldn't know, never been."

"Then maybe you should stop being asshole about it and start acting like the friend you claim you are."

It stings more than he's willing to admit. Mostly because he can understand why Ishida would say it the way he does. It doesn't make him either right or reasonable. It makes him a bastard.

Instead, Ichigo gets out of the bed, grabs the tray, and shoves it in the trashcan. Ishida watches him with enormous eyes, mouth slightly open in confusion.

"Problem solved," he declares.

Ishida takes a deep breath. Ichigo can practically hear him seething, "What're we supposed to eat then?"

"Pizza," Ichigo snaps and flips out his phone. He punches in the number and orders the most aggressive round of pizza ever while Ishida tries to tell him it's against hospital policy and the fact that he's even here is breaking quite a few rules, not to mention smuggling in food is unnecessary as he just threw out a perfectly good meal, and are you even listening, Kurosaki?

"Thank you for your patronage," he clerk says, slightly shaky as Ichigo almost shouts his own thanks and goodbye.

They stare at each other, neither of them backing down and the world once more only theirs. Ishida blinks a few times, his glasses sliding down his nose, but doing nothing to push them back up. Ichigo, too, holds his ground and works his jaw furiously while he does so.

"I'll go get the pizzas," he announces after what seems like a minor eternity.

"Fine." Ishida replies curt and sour.

Ichigo grabs his wallet, opens the door and finds himself alone in the hallway. He leans back against it, his hands still on the door-handle. He sighs and deflates. This was about food, for fucks sake, shitty, terrible hospital food.

Why on Earth is it that none of them can be adult around each other, but always resort to arguing like this? They'd talked like responsible adults, Ichigo honestly thought they might've moved past this shit. But who's he kidding? He and Ishida will always be like cats and dogs.

He lets his head fall back on the door. This is pathetic. He's pathetic.

He goes and gets the pizzas.

/

In between the disaster that is September and the white tentativeness of December, lies November. It came with heavy rain-showers and thunderstorms, with no attempt of making itself bearable.

It's November Ichigo remembers with a strange sort of fondness, like he remembers winter mornings and going to school as if it's nighttime, turning on the lights much earlier than the norm and drinking tea and reading magazines downstairs while Yuzu tells him about school and Karin does homework. It's cozy and cave-like, these months of darkness and Ichigo relishes them because of it.

November is similar in the way that it seems protected and isolated from the rest of the year, hidden away for a rainy day, ironically, since it only stayed dry three days in total.

It was a week after Ishida's birthday, maybe more, maybe less. Time is by now a strange concept to Ichigo. He's seen it manipulated and paused, forced and beaten so much so that it has lost most meaning.

He knows the reason they end up beneath neon signs, glowing softly in the heavy rain, reflecting their colors in the downpour. He knows they're alone because Inoue and Chad had the foresight of leaving before it turned into fat, heavy drops and he knows they're there because they went to see a movie as a late celebration of Ishida's birthday. It had been great fun listening to Ishida groan every time the protagonist drew her bow. Ishida seemed thoroughly unimpressed by the film, despite Ichigo and Inoue both wanted to go burn down some choice government facilities.

He was glad Keigo wasn't there. He would actually have made them go, handing them gasoline and matches as they went. And he would probably also have commented on the way Ichigo kept watching Ishida before, during and after the film.

Their socks were drenched and their feet were cold, because the rain was determined. Ichigo leaned against the chilly cement, watching Ishida hold out his hand under a stream of colorful water. It looked as if he was performing a spell, the light dancing in the water on to his face, to Ichigo's eyes.

Ishida removed his hand and shook the water of it. He dried it on his shirt, but kept looking out in the rain, as the lines between heaven and Earth bled together.

A car drove down the street, the music turned up so loud they could almost taste the chords and feel the bass. It disappeared quickly again, but not without splashing an indecent amount of water on the both of them. Not that anyone could tell; they had both been drenched before making it across the street.

"You didn't bring an umbrella?" Ishida asked, turning his head to Ichigo.

He shook his head and put his hands in his pockets, "Does it matter? We're both soaked anyway."

"I suppose not."

It was almost hazy out in the rain. The road looked to be squirming or quivering.

"Should we wait until it clears?" Ishida asked again.

Ichigo remembers him being strangely talkative. Whenever they spent time together, they would do so with Chad and Inoue as proxy and most conversation would go through them. Now that Ichigo thought about it, they hadn't been alone since September. He had a feeling Chad and Inoue had made a wordless agreement to keep them from being unsupervised for longer periods of time.

Ichigo shrugged.

Something crossed Ishida's face, a shadow of some kind at Ichigo's lack of worded response.

"Or we could brave it," he tried again, quietly. It's almost drowned out by the curtains of water falling to the ground. Ichigo licked his lips and looked away. It's not that he didn't want to be here, alone with Ishida, but it was cold and wet and weird being with someone that didn't want to be there with you.

Ishida didn't say anything for a while, just picked at his fingers, looking out into the water. He's restless and silent, like the streets, except for the heavens whispering secrets into the asphalt.

"Maybe we should –"

"I think –"

They quieted immediately, gathering their words again.

"You first," Ichigo offers.

"There's a corner-store a block down, we could make a run for it." He held his hand out again and let the heavy drops be caught in his palm. This time, there's a wistfulness to it, like he didn't want the suggestion to be taken seriously.

"Okay," Ichigo agreed. Ishida's shoulders sacked almost imperceptibly, which is strange, because under no circumstances whatsoever, was being stuck in the downpour with Ichigo an optimal outcome of situations. Because while Inoue and Chad had been kind enough to supervise them, Ishida had been kind enough to try and avoid him altogether.

Ishida turned and looked to him, his eyes wide and his mouth about to overflow with words, but he pressed his lips together and turned back around. Ichigo went to him and looked out, drops hitting his hair and the tip of his ears and his nose. "Alright, let's do this."

They ran into the shivering street, drenched in seconds but a certain giddiness overtook Ichigo and a smile broke on his face. He caught Ishida's eyes when he passed him, and he looked like he'd witnessed a sunrise, but quickly smothered it as he ran through a deep puddle.

As they raced down the street Ichigo couldn't help but laugh. He hadn't run like this, in the rain, smiling, since his mother had been around. Ishida didn't laugh, but he smiled and at the time it was enough. They didn't speak to each other, there was no need. They both knew whatever this was would be ruined if they did, so they kept quiet and kept running like children, zig-zagging between lampposts and mailboxes.

The streets were abandoned in favor of shelter, so they could run as crazily as they wanted. Ishida was faster, but Ichigo was far more enthusiastic.

And then he stopped. He'd landed himself in the middle of a cone of light from a mercury streetlight, bathed in unsteady white light. Ishida halted a few paces ahead of him and looked over his shoulder. Ichigo was out of breath, out of words, out of ideas, but he still managed to snort at himself and look down.

"Come on," Ishida said, "We're almost there."

It didn't sound as if he had anything to say, more that he needed to say something. Ichigo nodded and they walked the rest of the way.

When they finally reached the corner-store, they stepped inside, dripping on the floor and relaxing into the moderate warmth. They stood there, breathing for a few seconds before Ishida went to a bin with umbrellas in. He grabbed one and put it on the desk.

"7.500," the clerk said, eyeing them with dissatisfaction.

Ishida rifled through his wallet, "You have 2000?"

Ichigo moved with a start, rummaged through his pockets and drew a soaked wallet. He found two bills and handed them to Ishida. The other took them, their fingers brushing and Ichigo felt them folding in on themselves.

They left with an umbrella and while they didn't get any wetter, they walked close enough for their arms to brush time and time again. They kept quiet and before they realized, they'd reached Ishida's apartment-building.

"This is me," Ishida muttered.

Ichigo spoke before he thought, "Yeah, I don't live here."

They stood underneath a little cement projection, keeping them out of the rain. Ishida closed the umbrella and gave it to Ichigo, "You don't live here," he said as a way of explanation.

Ichigo took it and didn't move his feet. Ishida didn't go inside, Ichigo didn't head home and if the universe was playing with fates, this would have been when Ichigo could pinpoint it for certain.

His eyes flickered from Ishida's eyes to his mouth, a little chapped and bluish from the cold and Ichigo had never seen lips he'd rather …

He turned on his heel and left, hurriedly reopening the umbrella. His heart was hammering and his fingers were shaking and his knees felt weak. He almost didn't stop himself in time, but he didn't touch his lips only to confirm they were still cold and dry.

The umbrella still sits against his desk, mocking him every time he looks at it. Because he could've sworn, Ishida had looked at his lips too.

/

When Ichigo returns, his feet are cold and the pizza isn't faring much better. He's cursed Ishida's name a few times, then his own stupidity and then Ishida some more. And when the first wave of irrationality has passed, he sighs and shakes his head.

He passes a few nurses on his way. They all give him various expressions of incredulity, eyes zig-zagging between his face and the pizzas as if they can't fathom why he would get pizza when they have perfectly edible food right here. Nobody says anything though; no one does anything to stop him.

Outside the door, Ichigo takes a deep breath and knocks twice.

He doesn't receive an answer, so that's a good sign.

He pushes the door open and holds out the pizza, to show Ishida he's come in peace. Quickly, he enters and closes the door behind him. He tries to will his heart to slow down, before he turns around. He can almost hear the dissonance in their breathing, the way they never seem to see eye to eye.

Sometimes he wonders how he fell in love with Ishida at all. And sometimes he wonders why it took him so long.

"I thought you'd left," Ishida says. It's quiet, on the wrong side of dull. If Ichigo didn't know better, he'd say he detected notes of regret in his voice. Ichigo has never known Ishida to regret much if anything at all.

"Who'd get your pizza then?"

Ishida appears bashful. He's not meeting Ichigo's eyes and for once it feels as if it isn't Ichigo who fucked up. He walks over and tries, though not with as much expertise as Kano or Kita or whatever, to get the table in optimal position for dining. He struggles for a good five minutes before Ishida takes pity on him and with reserved movements unfold the table. He quickly retracts back to the other side of the bed.

Ichigo takes the silent offer and drags the table towards them, "I forgot drinks, but I suppose the water's okay here."

"I guess."

"Okay, what's up? Seriously, you're being weird."

Ishida frowns and leans, if possible, even further back into his pillow, "Why's it always like this?"

"Whaddya mean?" Ichigo asks and pushes one of the pizza-boxes towards Ishida. The other opens it dexterously and Ichigo wrestles open his.

"We fight whenever we talk about anything important. Why is it that we can't talk about something that actually matters without devolving into an old married couple who's grown to hate each other? Don't you ever wonder how …" His words die out and instead he looks down at his pizza, "These aren't cut."

Ichigo looks down as well and concludes that Ishida is right. He shrugs and picks up the pizza in it's entirety and takes a bite from it.

Ishida just watches him, blinks and then looks away.

"That's disgusting," he mutters, but picks up his own pizza as well and takes an experimental bite.

Sauce dabs the corners of his mouth and in the soft darkness, Ichigo feels himself fall in love all over again. Ishida licks it away before taking the next bite, but leaves Ichigo smiling weakly, hurrying to gulp down and swallow down another bit before Ishida notices he's watching him.

"They're not even warm," Ishida complains gently.

Ichigo leans deeper into the bed and shrugs, "Get them yourself next time then."

Ishida doesn't answer immediately and Ichigo is almost ready to chalk it up as a victory.

"Next time?" Ishida asks then.

And Ichigo's heart clenches at the almost pained tone Ishida laces into the question.

"We need something you can live for," he opts for instead and looks away towards the door.

"And that something is pizza with you?"

Ichigo shrugs. More than anything, he wants it to be enough. He wants pizza with him to be all that it takes to have Ishida change his mind, but he's not that self-absorbed. It's fear that keeps Ishida in this very bed, and it's not going to be pizza that has him leaving it.

"How's school?" Ishida questions. He sounds strained. Ichigo thinks it might be the silence getting to him, because he asked Ichigo the same question about a week ago and Ishida isn't one for being told repeats. But Ichigo concedes and tells him about the past week.

There's little to tell, very few events are equal to these moments Ichigo thinks. But he does his best to blow minor misdemeanors out of proportion, exaggerate their course load and intensify whatever situations he possibly can.

"So Ochi-Sensei had all of them thrown in jail."

"I know for a fact that would never happen," Ishida cuts in, his hands pulling apart his uneaten crust.

Ichigo looks at him and lifts his eyebrows, "I'm sorry, who's the one living in complete isolation from the surrounding world and thus, doesn't know jackshit about the very topic I'm recounting? Be grateful I even tell you."

Ishida stops shredding the bread and instead throws it at Ichigo. His aim is scarily accurate. Even in the dark he hits Ichigo right on the nose. A smear of tomato-sauce making him out as the clown he tries to convince Ishida he isn't.

Ishida on the other hand is back to torturing the crust.

"I'm sorry, what just happened?" Ichigo demands and twists his body forward so he can see Ishida's face.

"Don't be an asshole," Ishida answers, despite not really answering at all.

Ichigo lifts a hand, "Who's being an asshole? I'm not throwing my food at innocent bystanders!"

"Don't patronize me, Kurosaki."

"How am I patronizing you?"

Ishida clenches his hands and meets his eye, the heartrate-monitor is rabid, "Why can't you just tell me how things actually happened instead of making shit up? I'm not cut off from the world, you know, you're not my only link to reality! I don't like …"

He interrupts himself by looking away and folding his arms over his chest.

Ichigo swallows and stays completely still.

"And we're back to fighting," Ishida sighs and leans back, "Why can't we have a normal conversation?"

"You could start with not flying off the handle," Ichigo supplies, unhelpfully, he knows.

Ishida turns quickly, "And you could stop –" which he then does and rolls his eyes, "I can't take you seriously with pizza-sauce on the nose."

Ichigo scrunches up his nose and wipes it away with the back of his hand. "Better?"

"No," Ishida sighs and leans back.

Ichigo leans back with him and eats the rest of his pizza without any more interruptions from Ishida or any attempts at conversation. Ishida pushes his box around, never satisfied with its placement. Ichigo wants to say something and he's propelled back into December where snow was the order of day instead of talking. He misses how easy it was back when they first met, when Ishida hated his guts and Ichigo didn't want to bone him.

He checks his phone, a few texts but no missed calls. His family knows where he is and they know his hours are sketchy at best because they hinge upon Ishida's mood.

Some days he stays late enough to miss the last bus, other times he barely makes it inside the door before he's out of it again. And every time he leaves, no matter how many hours or how few minutes they spend together, Ichigo wishes he could stay just a second longer.

It's odd how finality makes one appreciative.

But it's nearly 9 on a school night and Ichigo's not at all finished with his homework, so he flips over the duvet and swings his legs over the edge of the bed.

Ishida snaps his head towards him, "Where're you going?"

"Those of us who've chosen to live still have school to attend," Ichigo sighs and struggles with his sneakers. They are uncooperative, his bare feet catching on the material.

Ishida doesn't move. He looks slightly panicked, his eyes flung open and restless. Ichigo stretches out after winning the struggle with his footwear and picks up his bag, "See you later."

He turns to the door and grabs the handle.

"Stay!"

Ichigo's blood stops, his breath weakens. With infinitely slow movements, he turns his head.

"Sorry?"

"Stay."

Ishida's sitting up, clutching the linen. There's something feverish in his eyes, a strange sheen that has Ichigo turning back to him.

"You sure?"

Ichigo almost wants him to say no and send him on his way. His spine almost curls in on itself in pure, undiluted dread and joy. It's like thousands upon thousands of leeches gnawing away at your flesh and sucking your blood; Ichigo's drained and at the same time, if Ishida asked, he would donate every single drop he had left.

Ishida nods twice. It the same amount of minutes it takes for Ichigo to peel off his shoes, put down his bag and crawl back into Ishida's bed. The other looks evasive, though shame has never been an emotion Ichigo would associate with Ishida. It sometimes feels as if the other is incapable of feeling the very sensation.

They sit for another ten minutes before Ishida huffs and pushes the table away from them, shimmies under the duvet and slaps Ichigo's arm to have him surrender the pillow. He does and is suddenly left in a dark room, Ishida settling in to sleep and himself? Ichigo takes a deep breath, pulls his t-shirt over his head and turns away from Ishida, getting comfortable as the second person in a one-man bed.

"Is this okay?" Ishida asks suddenly.

Ichigo swallows, "Anytime."

"I'm really tired."

"Go to sleep then, knucklehead," Ichigo says with copious amounts of false bravado.

Ishida doesn't reply. He slips away into sleep within minutes and Ichigo's happy that he can provide some sort of rest for the weary and wicked. He remains where he is, tries to move as little as possible.

Ichigo has nothing to go by for time. He has his phone but that's in his bag and that's all the way across the room. He listens instead to Ishida's breathing, the beep accompanying his heartbeat, the slight shuffling of his feet. The fact that Ishida sleeps almost drives Ichigo into further wakefulness.

He tries to think about school tomorrow, about how he's going to explain his attire to his friends, how Chad's going to pull him aside and ask him if he's sure about what he's doing, how he's going to have to endure Inoue's now less than subtle glances his way. His English and his algebra still in his bag, undone and incomplete. But then Ishida sighs and his train of thought derails.

He's hyperaware of the other person lying next to him, of the hitches in his breathing, the slight movement of his shoulders, the equipment with them constantly reminding them that Ishida's still alive. Ichigo would die if he had to sleep next to that machinery for more than one night. It pounds into your skull how alone and isolated you are.

Ichigo feels a lump in his throat when thinking about how Ishida spends every waking hour in this room. He'll bring a gift of some sort the next time he visits.

Ishida turns towards Ichigo. He's still sleeping, his breathing calm and quiet.

Suddenly, Ichigo feels feather light fingertips brush his nape. He stops moving, petrified and completely entranced. It's a barely there touch, nothing noteworthy, yet it meant an eternity to Ichigo as he lay and focused on breathing.

His blood heads south and Ichigo once again damns his body into the seven circles of Hell. His shifts his legs, feeling relief every time the friction sighs against his flesh. He swallows heavily, trying to be soundless, trying not to disturb Ishida. Ichigo forces himself to slowly, as quietly as possible, to get out of bed, glancing at Ishida asleep and unawares. He hurries to the bathroom, closes the doors, flicks on the light and kicks his still-wet clothes out of the way. With no ceremony, he sits down on the toilet and jams a hand down his pants.

He sighs in relief when he touches his prick. He drags it out of his pants and hurriedly tosses himself off, the back of his neck tingling all the while.

Ichigo grabs some toiletpaper and twists his hand, giving it a last jerk before he comes into the paper. He lets himself fall back and can't stop his head from keeling back as well.

He breathes. He thinks about Ishida. Thinks about him sleeping in the room next door and how he'd just masturbated to him gently, oh so gently touching his nape and he doubles over, trying to keep himself contained. Ichigo sometimes wishes the universe would spare him.

He tugs himself back in and turns off the light. With the same modus operandi, he sneaks back into bed and shuffles under the covers, trying to forget he just had a wank about the person next to him.

He falls asleep no less than an hour later, still thinking about Ishida and those damn fingers.

/

Ichigo always liked spring. There's something hopeful about the entire thing and Ichigo has always been a sucker for hope. This 1st of March though, brings very little of that. While the sun is in the sky earlier than usual, the warmth already digging greens from the earth, winter continues in Ichigo's mind.

He hasn't slept with Ishida again. He left at 5 o'clock the next morning, no sleep of importance earned and a guilty conscience in tow. He also had pages upon pages of homework to do, but he knew it was a threadbare excuse at best, cowardice none withstanding. So he snuck out at this ungodly hour, practically ran home with soaked clothes in his bag and a hammering heart. He'd looked over his shoulder as he opened the door and left.

When finally he closed the door to his room, he felt all energy go out of him. He leaned back on the door, slowly sliding down it, focusing on breathing. He rubbed his eyes absentmindedly and sighed. It was with great effort he got up and hauled himself over to his bed. He dived in head first, asleep before he hit the pillow.

The next morning he'd skipped school and spent the rest of the day drying his bag and books, doing algebra and English and constantly reminiscing about the fingers ghosting his neck the night previously. He got a cold for his troubles as well, it was the end of February after all.

He didn't go and see Ishida again until the 3rd of March.

And that had been an unmitigated disaster.

Ichigo could practically feel the miasma of pure wrath in the hallway, he had stupidly enough thought it wouldn't be directed at him. Honestly, when had any of Ishida's ire ever been targeted at someone other than Ichigo?

If Ishida could pace, he would've walked trenches into the floor by the time Ichigo finally entered. He leveled him with such a foul stare that Ichigo felt his heart stutter just from standing in the door.

"Is this a bad time?"

To which Ishida had turned his head away and put in his earphones.

Ichigo had a feeling this had something to do with his untimely leave a little over a week ago. He wanted to … he didn't know what he wanted. Well, he wanted to kiss Ishida and have the other kiss him back. He wanted to be allowed to sleep in his bed without feeling like he'd taken advantage.

But Ishida was resolutely not looking at him and that had Ichigo heart tearing itself apart. He averted his eyes and nodded instead.

"I'll be going then," he mumbled and stepped out of the room.

Two wars, countless fights and so much death had taught him the art of choosing his battles.

So he walked back home and spent the weekend there, sulking.

He's decided that Ishida ought to have cooled down now. At least, he should be approachable. So he walks, enjoys the timid sun because he knows spring also promises rain and rain and more rain. It's almost as if spring is out to rebirth the world with all the water it pours down into the world.

The hospital looks like itself, white, tall, looming. The leaden clouds that usually brewed at its temples have vanished in favor of blue nothingness.

Ichigo crosses the parking lot his eyes on the fourth window from the end, three rows up. He stops dead in his tracks, because the windows open and the curtains are flapping in the teasing wind. Ichigo speeds up and goes to the front desk.

"Ishida Uryuu?" he pretends he knows nothing about the layout, that he doesn't know more nooks and crannies than most of the staff do by now.

"Room 503," she answers. And why wouldn't she? It's visiting hours and there's a line forming behind him. He thanks her and hurries to the elevator, closing it before any others can get on, slowing him down because they need to stop at every floor between here and 5th.

It pings and he squeezes out before the doors are fully open. He knew it. Ishida has been moved to the ICU. He walks along the corridor, room 8, room 6, room 4, room 2 … he looks to the other side and sees room 3. The name on the sign says Ishida U., so Ichigo can only assume this is it.

But now that he stands here, he hesitates. For all the hurry he was in a minute ago, he cannot bring himself to knock. So he watches the door for what seems like forever before he curses himself and does it.

There's no answer, but there rarely is. So he opens the door, slides inside and closes the door.

"Kurosaki?" Ishida asks. There's something off center in his voice. He sounds hopeful, yet disgusted at the same time. Ichigo looks around and find this room to be both smaller and darker than the other one. He stubs his toe against a chair that thunders across the floor, though only moving a centimeter.

The beeping is still the same, the temperature's still cool. Ichigo pads the air for the chair and when he finds it, he drags it closer and sits down.

"How're you doing?" he tries.

"Pretty great actually. I can't feel my fingers," Ishida replies. There're false smiles and laughter in his answer and Ichigo frowns. He also hears the fear that's creeping into the words.

"And then you've been avoiding me," Ishida adds.

"Yeah," Ichigo sighs, "Sorry about that."

Ishida doesn't answer, but Ichigo imagines he pulls a face of some sort. "Sorry doesn't help me, Kurosaki." It was said so gently that Ichigo almost mistook it for an annoyed sigh.

"Morphine helps me. Not with that, but in general."

Ichigo couldn't even say anything to that. He just sat there, eyes slowly relaxing into the dark, Ishida's outline becoming clearer, shades of black revealing depths and levels. The monitor beeps, always beeping, like silence is an outlaw and peace a crime. It's as if every beep is a drop of water hitting his head, slowly becoming heavier, pounding, drilling it's way into his skull. He wonders how Ishida hasn't gone insane from the incessant beeping yet, the infernal beeping, the constant beeping.

And yet, it's serene. Because when they're not talking they're not hurting each other. If September was harsh, March is devastating. Because while September was cruel words and loud knives, March has silence at its disposal and silence seems to be infinitely sharper than the long knives of September.

The silence is grating. Ichigo doesn't know what he prefers anymore. It had been good between them. Why did February end the same way September began? He felt like they'd had a shot then.

"I don't understand how you can claim that we're friends and then treat me, all of us, like this," he said, voice growing in volume and surety. Ishida's voice was graveled but still the sweetest song to Ichigo's ears, though often times bitter and acrid to the taste.

"We are friends," Ichigo countered automatically by now.

He could practically feel the air seethe with disbelief then as Ishida looked at him, cutting through the black like a beam of light, "It would seem I comprehend a great deal more in the concept of friends than you do, then."

While they had had this argument many, many times, for the first time Ichigo shook his head, not in disagreement but in disbelief that Ishida meant it. And what then? They weren't friends apparently despite everything they had been through together and then how could he possibly ever come to love Ichigo like he loved Ishida and how could he ever persuade Ishida to choose life when he wouldn't even let Ichigo lay down his life for him like he'd done so many times before?

"Then I guess we never will be, huh?" Ichigo suddenly understands why Inoue smiles that not-smile when they talk with Ishida. He feels himself do the same now as not to have his voice betray him.

"I guess not," Ishida sounds pained, but that might as well just be the morphine wearing off, God knows Ichigo has very little effect on Ishida unless it's to upset him.

He takes the hint and gets up, walking towards the little sliver of light under the door. Ichigo wants to say something, wants to have the last word, but he can't muster the power or the courage. He has never thought of himself as a coward, but as he stands in front of the door heading away from Ishida for what seems the hundredth and last time, he can't even shape coherent words.

"Kurosaki?" Ishida calls and Ichigo, still willing to throw himself off a bridge for his name to be sung in that voice, inclines his head, hoping Ishida won't see the pained shape of his mouth.

"Nothing," he mends.

Ichigo opens the door then and walks out with a calm he didn't know he possessed. He breathes out and finds his heart breaking in the process.

/

It's a week before someone talks to him. His mood has been foul and nothing short of terrible. His dejection morphed into anger without too much effort and he's been stewing in his thoughts the past few days.

It's raining, raining like you wouldn't believe. He's surprised no one drowned on their way to school. It's nice having the weather reflect your mood, he thinks. Ichigo leans back and balances his weight on the two hind legs. His hands are drumming on the table, melting into the sound of the rain.

"Kurosaki-kun?"

Ichigo drags his eyes away from the downpour outside, thinking about November and feeling cold. Inoue sits down next to him and looks imploringly at him.

"Inoue," he greets her. His tone must reveal a great deal more about his state of mind than he thought, because he sees her frown deepen and her lips thinning.

"Ishida-kun is getting worse," she tells him. It sounds like a prologue, something that explains the later point. But Inoue doesn't appear to follow up, she has her eyes down, not in embarrassment but in thought. There're a great many people who confuses Inoue's quietude for submission.

"When he doesn't want help, that's to be expected," Ichigo keeps his reply curt and short.

Inoue's eyes pins his with a fierce stare, "He does!"

"Does not."

Ichigo's somewhat ashamed that he's resorted to kindergarten tactics, but he really doesn't know how to explain to Inoue that Ishida might want help, just not from him and that hurts. And also that they might not be talking, why Ichigo still doesn't know. Well, he thinks it's because he left, but he doesn't understand why Ishida's so upset, truthfully. He would've had to leave at 7 anyways unless he was to miss school and why on Earth would Ishida be up before noon when he had nothing to shorten his days besides sleep?

Something in his expression has Inoue softening and then gently touching his shoulder, "Are you fighting?"

"Aren't we always?" he scoffs.

"No." Her answer is short but saturated.

"I don't think it matters, Inoue."

She tilts her head, asking him to go on but without interruption. Sometimes she can be quite artful in her way of coaxing the truth from you. Where Chad uses silence, she uses suggestions.

"If we can't be friends, then how can we ever have a relationship?"

"Who says you're not friends?"

"Who're we talking about?"

Inoue hums and looks to the ceiling as if the answer to all of Ichigo's qualms are up there if only you look hard enough.

"Have you told him?"

He scoffs again, hopefully conveying how poor he thinks the idea is. Inoue gently places her eyes on his and smiles a fading half-smile, "I've never felt better than after I confessed to you."

Ichigo's about to protest, to apologize, but Inoue interrupts him, "After I confessed to you, I got to let you go."

"I don't want to let him go," Ichigo mutters.

Inoue nods, "There's that too. But maybe you need worry less about what you want and more about what Ishida-kun needs. Doesn't he deserve to know?"

Ichigo nodded and sighed, "Yeah. I suppose he does."

"If you were dying and Ishida-kun kept something like this from you, how would you feel?"

"That doesn't count, I'd be thrilled knowing he liked me back –"

Inoue just looks at him expectantly. She waits him out, wants him to acknowledge the impossible.

"He doesn't."

Inoue sighs, "How would you know? You've never asked him."

Ichigo turns his head away. The rain's still tapping at the window, like a stranger seeking refuge.

"And he really is getting worse. He doesn't have that much time."

"You very calm about this," Ichigo interjects and looks at her, smiling ruefully.

Inoue smiles at him, "That's because I know you'll save him, Kurosaki-kun."

"Find out exactly what question you want to ask him," she adds as an afterthought.

She gets up and gives him another smile over her shoulder. Ichigo watches her go to Tatsuki and strike up a conversation with her as if she hasn't just turned Ichigo's world upside down. Because that's what it comes down to, really. That one question that's been nagging him ever since the summer ended.

He hadn't given up when Rukia had been sentenced to death, not when Inoue had been kidnapped or when he'd lost every ounce of power he had, or when Soul Society had crumbled, then he owes Ishida to not give up on him either.

Ichigo had almost forgotten how it felt having a responsibility that seemed too heavy to shoulder alone, but he'd done it before, surely he could do it again. He'd faced down Aizen, Yuha Bach, Ginjo, one psychopath after the other, then by all means, he should be able to face down Ishida as well.

He swallowed and turned his eyes back into the rain.

/

It's only two hours later and he's outside Ishida's ward. He tries steadying his breathing, tries taking the air deep into his lungs, tries not breathing at all. It doesn't work. Mostly because he can't calm himself, can't slow he blood rushing in his veins.

He knocks once, then loses momentum and lets his hand slide down the door. He curses himself for being a coward and pushes open the door.

It doesn't look any different, yet the feeling of absolution permeates the very air. Ishida's watching him with cool blue eyes, he doesn't even squint at the light and he wonders if he doesn't care anymore and just wants to see what's still to be seen. Ichigo comes closer and sits down. The nasogastric tube is new.

He forgoes a greeting , "Can I ask you something?" Ichigo almost drawls in an attempt to keep himself from rushing the question. Ishida's eyes are bruised from lack of rest, he's paler than he's ever been before – even after Ichigo planted _Zangetsu_ in his gut.

Ishida rasps, "You will either way."

"Why didn't you kill me?"

"Why does it matter?"

"Because you're going to be dead in a matter of weeks," Ichigo pushes.

Ishida bristles as much as he can in his current state. It's more like watching a sleepy puppy trying to growl and bare it's teeth. Ichigo's not sure if it's because he's been chewed up by things far more intimidating than Ishida at this current moment, but he can't find it in himself to rise to it. It's odd, but he's completely, deceivingly calm now that he's finally there.

"I couldn't. There." He turns away, tries to make it final, but Ichigo gets the feeling that Ishida wants him to chase him down the rabbit hole. So Ichigo tries unearthing some of that famous courage and breathes in.

"Why?"

"Because …" Ishida trails off, looking troubled. Like he can't find the right words.

"Because what?"

"Why're you forcing this conversation?" Ichigo should've known not to push Ishida to talk when he's looking for words. So Ichigo tries again, this time checking himself not to push Ishida again. "Why couldn't you kill me, Ishida?"

And Ishida, wonderfully smart, stupid, inherently arrogant and caring Ishida, looks almost pleading at him. Ichigo leans back as not to force the issue again, giving him space to thinkg. Ishida seems appeased, relaxes a little into his deathbed.

Ichigo wonders if Ishida can smell the death on the sheets that he himself thinks he can. If the disinfectant has turned to embalming fluids yet or if it's still scratching spirit. He listens to Ishida's heartbeat, tries not to pry further by wondering what has his heart racing and beeping.

Finally, Ishida says, "Because I couldn't do that to the people who love you."

Ichigo lets a half-smile cross his face. "We aren't friends, why would you care?"

"Of course we're friends," Ishida objects almost tiredly. He's staring at nothing.

Because isn't that the question of the century? Ichigo has wondered time and time again why Ishida constantly pushes and pulls him. He doesn't mind them sleeping together in the same bed, but they're not friends; they have each other's back, but they're never with each other out of choice; they're about to kill one another, but Ishida doesn't because he worries for the people who love Ichigo, yet they're nothing to each other?

Ichigo feels his calm etch away, "Then why do you keep saying we're not?"

"Because you're stupidly conscientious!"

Ichigo blinks, "What?"

"It's almost like you consider it your sacred duty to put your life on the line for us. I thought – no, I hoped that if you thought I didn't consider us friends you wouldn't extend that to me."

"Ishida, I consider you to be more important than my friend." Ichigo felt his stomach plummet. His mouth had operated without his consensus, suddenly incredibly happy he wasn't hooked up to the heart monitor.

What makes it a hundred times worse, is the look Ishida gave him, one of absolute shock. His eyes are wide and his mouth is loose on his jaws, lips slightly parted as a result. Ichigo's completely deaf to the machinery in the room, to the nurses outside knocking on the door, instead accutely aware of everything Ishida does in that very moment.

He hurries to mend it, tries to salvage the wreck he just made of his confession, "Okay, that came out wrong. Ishida, I like you both as a friend, but also as … more."

"What?" Ishida looks like a deer caught in the headlights.

Ichigo swallows and looks down, "You're not stupid, Ishida, you know what I said."

"What do you want me to do with that?" Ishida asks, a strange mixture of scared and angry.

"Nothing," Ichigo answers, "I don't expect anything from you."

Ishida shakes his head and hides it in his hands. It reminds him of when relatives await and finally hear earthshattering news, when they learn that everything's been done, but it's been in vain and there's nothing more to do. It reminds him of the moment when the bottom of your world falls out and he hates that he made Ishida feel like that.

"Do you want me to leave?" Ichigo frowns, avoids looking too much at Ishida.

There's no answer, so he stays.

"Really?" Ishida croaks.

"Yeah."

At this point Ichigo has very little standing to save by lying. Also, Ishida doesn't deserve it.

"Why?"

Ichigo pauses, doesn't know how to answer that. He ends up shrugging.

"That's reassuring," Ishida mumbles.

"Well?" Ichigo inquires.

Ishida's smart, that's why he knows what Ichigo's actually asking. He does Ichigo the favor of meeting his eyes.

"Yeah," he almost whispers, "Yeah, me too."

Ichigo lifts his eyes and meets Ishida's, "Really?"

Ishida simply nods, but it's heavy and more like a surrender than a jubilee.

"Kurosaki, this doesn't change anything."

"What do you mean?"

"My decision hasn't changed."

Ichigo immediately stands, "Ishida, come on!"

"I can't just risk your life on the off-chance that you could save mine!"

He starts pacing, veering his hands and rubbing his eyes, "Ishida, look. I know you're scared" Ishida looks ready to protest, "– don't give me that – I can see it your eyes, you're terrified of this. There's nothing noble in letting yourself die. If I want to try and save you, I damn well will."

"What if I don't want you to?"

Ichigo stops in his tracks. He's at the foot of the bed and he forces himself to face Ishida's gaze. It's flinty, piercing like his arrows and aiming for the kill.

Therefor he takes a deep breath.

"Please, just ... Ishida, I'm not asking you to stop your martyrdom for the sake our love or something equally nauseating, I'm asking because a lot of people trust me to save you. Your dad, Inoue, Chad, they're all freakishly worried about you, we all are. You can't honestly tell me that you're ready to die at the ripe age of 18. You have places to see and people to meet and Ishida, I'd like for us to do those things together, but …"

"But you could die," Ishida abducts his sentence and lets down the bow.

Ichigo shrugs, "You'd do the same."

"You sure?"

"Of course." Ichigo knows this like he knows the sun is a star and Ishida's eyes can outshine it any day.

Ishida watches him with something akin to insecurity. Ichigo goes for the throat then.

"Ishida, my life is usually on the line because someone else put it there initially. I want to gamble my life if it means you get a chance to live, I want to make that choice. And ultimately it's mine, isn't it?"

The silence is pregnant with will, the way silence always is in a hospital. He sees Ishida think it over twice, thrice, four, five, six times. The seconds, time, his thoughts changes his face. He sometimes looks up to Ichigo, time and time again, wanting validation, somewhere to stand, to make sure he's still there, Ichigo doesn't know. What he does know is that Ishida slowly seems to remember that there's a life outside these walls and it's something in within his reach.

Ichigo wonders how the past three months have been for Ishida. He's been locked away from the world and while they've visited him as much as they could, Ishida has still spent most of his time alone, thinking, tossing, turning, thinking some more. It's lonely when you only have your own thoughts as company and it never occurred to Ichigo that Ishida might've been conditioning himself for the inevitable this entire time. And no wonder. None of them ever left any memento that would allow Ishida to remember them in their absence.

Ishida's swallowing heavily, not affected by the nasogastric tube that circles his face and Ichigo's heart breaks a little as he realizes he doesn't even know when it was necessary to keep Ishida nourished through plastic and wires.

It's to miniscule he almost misses it, but Ishida's shoulders fall and he starts curling in on himself like paper burning, "If you die, I'll kill you," he says, brittle.

/

It's a mix of sighs, smiles and thoughtful frowns that meets him when he tells them that Ishida has agreed to try and save his life. Chad allows a low chuckle as if he knows something Ichigo doesn't; Inoue smiles wide, hugs him and whispers in his ear, "I knew you could do it."; Ryuuken sighs in relief and nods before he turns away and goes to call on his son, presumably; and Urahara frowns as he's told his theory will be put to the test.

The mood is almost solemn when they meet outside Ishida's room. They never agreed on a time, but March 7th at one o'clock at night, they find each other outside the ward and walk down the hall.

A nurse opens the door for them and closes it after her on her way out. Ichigo recognizes her as the one who pointed at him like a protective elder sister of Ishida's. She gives him a square glance as if she's trying to tell him she knows what's going on. Ichigo nods at her and swallows, knowing the chances of this working are small.

But they're there.

Ishida's awake, looking at his heart monitor when they enter. His eyes plucks the different faces and lands on Ichigo's. He doesn't look away.

Urahara sets up whatever equipment he needs. Something akin to a transfusion line, a little canister, two needles. He hooks the line into the crook of Ishida's elbow. Ishida doesn't even wince, but Ichigo supposes this is just another manic Monday for him.

"Any last requests?" Urahara asks.

"Open the curtains," Ishida responds. Inoue moves to reveal the night sky outside. The stars are clearly visible tonight, the moon nowhere to be seen. Ishida sighs and looks to the black. His breathing's calm. He seems ready.

Ichigo winces when Urahara does the same to him. The line starts filling with blood and Ichigo wonders if they should've run maybe a test or two before they did this, not finding it medically sound at all. He could have herpes for all they know but he supposes it's a moot point.

Ryuuken seems unfazed, so Ichigo decides to be the same.

"It shouldn't be long now," Urahara says.

And that's suddenly when it hits Ichigo like a shit-ton of metaphorical bricks that Ishida will die. His heart implodes and the air is almost sucked out of his lungs. He tries to swallow down the feeling, but it doesn't help the icy nails running down his back.

Something cold touches his fingers and looks down. Ishida's fingertips are brushing his and Ichigo tries swallowing again, this time the feeling dims. Ichigo gives Ishida a little half-smile and gets a weak flicker in return. Ishida holds on to his index-finger. It's weak and comforting in the wrong way.

While they share this, this moment far more intimate than Ichigo's ever tried before, the others in the room look away, pretend not to see that potent and fragile touch between them.

Ishida's eyes start blinking, heavier, feather-light, like led. The heart monitor slows and Ichigo's heart's stuck in his throat, his hands are shaking while Ishida's breathing becomes labored and light.

There's an empty, tense moment and then Ishida dies.

"Alright, step aside, please," Urahara asks and removes the line from both arms and takes out the two ampules. He hands one to Ryuuken who removes Ishida's shirt and carefully slides the needle in the chest of his only son, 19 millimeters to the left of his heart. Urahara does the same, a lot less tender and far more business-like with Ishida's neck.

They inject whatever's in the ampules and step away quickly.

"What was that?" Inoue asks, her voice quivering like a bowstring.

Ryuuken keeps his eyes on Ishida, "My _reiatsu_."

"What now?" Chad asks.

"Now we call the professionals," Urahara says and finds a thermos, pours himself some tea while Ryuuken pulls the string alerting everyone in the building that help is needed.

Ichigo can't breathe. He doesn't understand why they're not moving, why no one's yelling code blue, why he's not holding Ishida's hand. There's so much in that moment that doesn't make sense.

It's quiet again. Like a mausoleum, except Ishida's still warm and his cheeks, pale yes, still have a rosy hue that spells December and Ichigo wants to pace, to walk a furrow in the floor, but he stands still, doesn't move.

Hospital personnel run through the door, Kita among them. She looks to Ichigo immediately like he's to blame, which he suppose isn't that farfetched. The team immediately administers yet another injection.

Inoue's standing with her back turned, clutching Chad's hand. The other remains an everlasting pillar of the world, holds Inoue's hands and watches Ishida like a hawk. He looks withered, though. Like the sun hasn't seen it's favorite child in months, like a child scared of sleep, waiting for a parent to tell them everything's going to be okay.

They proceed with defibrillators and clears the floor. Ichigo's pushed further back, towards the wall and can't see Ishida in the cloud of blue scrubs. It charges, it shocks.

Ryuuken looks impassive, but Ichigo rather suspects he's clutching on to whatever composure he has left.

They clear again and the machine recharges. He closes his eyes.

Urahara drinks his tea.

And then the monitor beeps.

Ichigo looks to Urahara immediately, who passes his tea to Chad. Inoue's still frozen, doesn't move until the second beep comes and then she shies away from the wall and looks to Ishida.

Urahara takes the canister and empties it into his palm. Two pills, dull red and dusty blue, is then popped into a glass of water and start fizzing. Even Ichigo with no grasp on the art of feeling _reiatsu_ feels it sprouting from the glass.

The doctors step back, relieved that they didn't lose their director's son. They smile at one another and one dares smile at Ryuuken who merely nods. They perform a last check on Ishida, making sure he won't go into cardiac arrest or anything equally dangerous. The four of them leave, Kita included, but one goes to Ryuuken and asks whether or not he's sure that they should leave.

The older Quincy barely seems interested in his employee, but manages another curt nod.

Ishida's eyes opens like a rare flower and Ichigo finds his heart on the floor and air in his lungs again. Ishida looks wrecked. Ichigo supposes death and defibrillators will do that to you. He barely gets to take a breath before Urahara puts the glass to his mouth and forces him to drink.

The water runs down Ishida's chin and he's out of breath, for probably the first time in months, when he's emptied the glass. Urahara lets Ryuuken check his vitals, as if the doctors had done nothing of the sort, while Urahara checks Ichigo, looks him over and asks him questions about his well-being. Truth be told, Ichigo only felt the prick of the needle and then the massive heartache on Ishida's behalf.

So he answers Urahara's questions. Albeit a little distractedly, because Ishida's gaining both color and vitality and Ichigo feels warmth flood his veins and relief pour out into his fingertips.

Ishida's eyes finds him, "Okay?" he mouths and Ichigo nods and can't help the smile that breaks, shatters, dawns on his face.

Ishida only lifts the corners of his mouth before his eyes close.

The heart monitor still beats steadily, letting Ichigo's shaky nerves know, Ishida's only asleep.

/

April is rainy and lush. It's like the ground breathes in the downpour and Ichigo wrestles open the umbrella before stepping out of the bus into the fray. It's the same one they bought in November and Ichigo thinks it's fitting considering he's here to walk Ishida home.

He's been counting down the days in his head. Ishida's been through another month of hospitals, but he's been moved to lighter, airier rooms as his eyes once again got used to the sun and his muscles the exercise. He has lost almost 30 pounds while bedridden and has spent the first month of spring rebuilding them, reshaping his body to what it once was.

The rain hangs like crystals, lining the umbrella.

Ichigo sees Ishida by the entrance. He's holding a backpack and has his hand out in the rain. Ichigo's thrown back into November and smiles.

His shoes are soaked, stepping through puddles and small lakes will do that, but Ichigo's happy – happier than he's been in a long while.

Ishida turns his head, lowering his arm. He spots Ichigo and picks up his bag.

"You're late," Ishida greets him. It's like they've moved past that part in the relationship where you greet one another.

"The bus was late, I couldn't very well threaten the driver to go faster, could I?"

"It would've been a nice gesture."

"I'm sure," he says, smiling all the while. He can't stop it seems.

Ichigo hands Ishida the umbrella, "You don't live here."

It's only a second before Ishida lights up and smiles, "No, I don't live here."

/

 **EPILOGUE**

Ishida's lying on his side, watching Ichigo sleep. It could easily become a habit, he thinks as he traces the frown that only ever seems to reappear in his sleep these days.

Ishida can't sleep himself. He's jetlagged and his internal clock is approximately 10 hours behind.

He licks his lips and curls his hand around Ichigo's sheets. Inoue's snoring softly next door, but the walls are paperthin and nothing in this apartment's a secret. That's why Inoue, Sado, Asano and Kojima went to bed with earplugs, headphones and cotton stuffed in their ears.

They've disappointed so far. Ichigo has classes tomorrow; combining medicine with philosophy is a heavy course load and his third semester schedule is hellish on top of that.

Ichigo's interest in philosophy is newfound. It sprung directly from Ishida's brush with death and Ichigo took to read Kant, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Socrates, Aristotle. He hates Plato, doesn't own a single copy of anything he's written. When Ishida found him at arrivals, he was chewing his bottom lip and reading _Three Discourses on Imagined Occasions_. Ishida had fallen in love all over again.

They had been together six months when Ishida decided he wanted to travel. Ichigo had frowned, looked a little conflicted but ultimately nodded. It had hurt when he hadn't even tried suggesting he'd come along. At first Ishida had stewed in anger while he'd been planning his trip, going to China first, getting on the Trans-Siberian Railroad, seeing Mongolia, getting off in Skt. Petersburg, then travel to Prague and Istanbul. He'd then go to Rome, Barcelona and then finally spend a month in Germany.

Ichigo had slowly pulled himself out of Ishida's life and he wondered if he'd done something wrong in telling Ichigo that he would be travelling the world and not putting emphasis on that it didn't have to be alone. Because Ichigo wasn't the only one who'd changed. Ishida found himself far more patient, however, much more impulsive and curious as well. After three months of imprisonment, Karakura, even Japan seemed small and crammed and Ichigo didn't understand that. He read philosophy, had on one occasion asked Ishida what dying felt like and had otherwise carried on like always.

Ishida had been suffocating the final semester, which had been extended by another two months for him. He made a deal with Ryuuken as his life slowly began choking him. He would work as hard as always, get grades like he always had, take his final exam and finish high school, then Ryuuken would free up his inheritance and let him see the world.

Maybe that was why so many of his friends hadn't realized he was leaving before he told them he was going as far away as possible. He supposes, that on the surface he'd seemed as determined and dedicated as always, keeping up his grades and rank.

Leaving Karakura, leaving Japan, had been like growing wings.

He'd had a travel journal and in his loneliest hours, he'd pretended that all the sights, sounds, foods, peoples, places, arts he'd written down was spoken out loud to Ichigo. Sometimes he couldn't breathe because he missed him so much, but he also knew he was where he was supposed to be.

Russia had been breathtaking, Prague steeped in mist and streetlights, Istanbul dusty, loud and vast. Rome had been grandiose, curvy, bubbly, Barcelona a fiery and proud city. And Germany had been everything he though it wouldn't be. He'd found himself fitting in.

Ishida ended up spending a year in Hamburg. He found an apartment there, enrolled in a university, studied German and literature. He'd still travel whenever he felt like it. He would take several weeks off and go to India in the fall, Kenya in the spring, Holland, France, England, Denmark, Belgium, Portugal, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland over the weekend.

If his months of being chained to a bed had taught him anything, it was that school was disposable, life wasn't.

It had been a grey, yet sunny afternoon, he'd been sitting on an internet-café, writing Inoue, Ryuuken, checking his mail, his bank-accounts (he might be restless, but he wasn't stupid) when Ichigo had written him.

Ishida's heart had started hammering like the bell-towers of the gothic churches. Ichigo had asked him where he was, what he was doing, when, if ever, he was coming back. Ishida's fingers had been shaking while he had written a reply. He read it three times over and then logged off and hurried home.

He'd written, "Hamburg, Bleicherstraβe 34."

Ishida had barely slept that night. He had more or less invited Ichigo to come stay with him at least that was the intention. He hoped Ichigo would figure out the missive.

So Ishida stayed in Hamburg for a month without giving in and going to Copenhagen like he had planned he'd do this November.

Nothing happened.

He checked his mail every day, spent an absurd amount of both time and money on internet-cafés. He even began alternating, because he didn't want the cashiers to think he was obsessed, but who was he kidding really?

Ishida had spent the better part of his teenage years besotted with Kurosaki Ichigo. Every time he thought he'd gotten it under control, Ichigo would do something, anything, nothing was too big, nothing too small and the lid would fly off. He would often thank the Gods for equipping him with an impenetrable poker face and composure.

And then he'd been about to kill Ichigo. He had thought he could do it, seeing as he'd fired a _Licht Regen_ at him, he'd thought he was finally free of it, but when he'd gone for the kill, something in Ichigo's eyes, something so utterly familiar and yet so incredibly foreign made him stutter and gave Ichigo ample opportunity to finish the job. Which he of course didn't. Idiot.

So Ishida spent most of his senior year lurking about in shame. He knew the minute he set foot on earthly ground again that he was going to die. There was something withering within him and it didn't take more than a few nights probing at it to know it was malign.

He told no one. It was his cross to bear, his bed to sleep in. And he'd already done enough to the people who called him friend, even after all this, he couldn't … so he didn't.

Ichigo didn't seem to care all that much about what Ishida had decided for himself. He kept coming back, like a record stuck in the same track. Because that's what they were, really. They'd rile each other up, be vicious, be mean, be terrible to one another and then they'd part ways, rinse, repeat.

And Ishida was tired. Having a death sentence hanging over your head put things into perspective.

But when Ichigo finally left him alone, he had no idea what to do then. So he kept away, nursed his failing eyes, tried eating four or five painkillers every day before school.

October was a strange beast. Because while he was staying clear of Ichigo, he constantly found him in his periphery. It was like the Vandenreich, like Juha Bach had never happened.

Then a rainy, yet dry November, then a warm December and then January, a black January.

February was the worst. Because while January had been black, February had been colored by hope. Ishida had found himself on the receiving end of a witty, calming, talkative and actively funny Ichigo who'd treat him like he felt what Ishida felt. There was an illusion at play that would break every time Ichigo took a step too close, because it taught Ishida to hope, his naïve heart almost breaking every time Ichigo did something nice for him.

They had a truce.

Ishida had even decided to go against his reason and his stupid brain, and asked Ichigo to stay the night.

Waking up alone shouldn't have been a shock. Ichigo had school and would've had to leave early anyways, but the bed was cold and Ishida even colder. He decided then and there that death might as well just move him up the line, this waiting game was exhausting, hurtful and feral. As the days had passed, he lost all will. It had been idiotic of him to think it would be reciprocated and one thing Ishida hated feeling was stupid.

He seemed to get his wish. After a week, he was moved to Intensive Care.

Bittersweet would be his choice-word for describing the moment Ichigo confessed to him. Even more so, when he finally felt himself break, when he realized that he hadn't realized he was feeling terrible because he'd forgotten how it felt to feel good. In a way, Ichigo saved his life twice over that day.

Long story short, he wanted, with a burning passion, to have Ichigo come visit him. He'd been fighting tooth and nail for his life that last night because he wanted to know if he'd remember happy again. And he missed him. He had no friends here, he didn't want any. But it was lonely.

Ishida is by nature rather solitary, but now that winter got closer and the darkness grew denser, it was difficult not to look out the window and wish you were the one walking down the streets, hand in hand with your lover.

Ishida was never really good with winter. He tends to blacken with the days and his mood usually dives right along with it. He wasn't sure if it was a trick of the mind, but Hamburg seemed even colder and darker than Karakura ever had.

To pass time he masturbated. A lot. Mostly out of boredom. Ishida probably knew the Pornhub sections by heart by now.

When masturbating lost it's novelty (around the 12th of November) he turned to the library and checked out all the book he'd always wanted to read. He'd forgotten how good reading was when you didn't want or didn't have company and you wanted to keep the winter at bay.

On the 15th of November he received an answer, "Okay."

Ichigo could've perhaps been a bit wordier, because Ishida was struggling to put a voice to that word. Okay as in, "Fine, I don't know why you write an address," okay as in, "I got you, but no," or okay as in, "On my way,"?

On November 17th he got his answer.

He was reading _The Sorrows of Young Werther_ when the doorbell rang. He cornered the page, swung his legs over the couch and went to unlock his door.

"I really hope the address was an invitation, otherwise this is awkward," Ichigo greeted him. They hadn't spoken in over a year and Ishida simply nodded. Because words were poor when he tried expressing himself.

Ichigo sniffed, "Sweet."

They stood there in the doorway for another minute, neither of them speaking, neither moving.

Ishida was cataloguing all the changes he could see in Ichigo. He had gained a few more pounds, muscles it seemed, grown into his full height, and a certain kind of confidence hung in the air around him. His hair, as always, was simmering ember and dying sunlight and Ishida'd always loved that hair.

"I hadn't really thought much further than this," Ichigo admits and Ishida realizes he's being a terrible host. He steps away from the door and retreats a little further into his apartment.

"How about you come in first?"

It hadn't taken them more than two hours before they ended up on Ishida's bed groping, kissing, clinging to each other. Clothes came off, skin got to skin and another half an hour, Ichigo was sleeping like a rock and Ishida was watching him much like he did now.

They'd taken walks down the Reperbahn, Ishida had asked about Ichigo's life, about Inoue, Sado, everybody really.

Ichigo told him they'd found an apartment in Nishikyo Ward in Kyoto; him, Inoue, Sado, Asano and Kojima. He'd begun studying medicine, but also taken up philosophy. Sado was working for Amnesty International while Inoue was studying flowers, as Ichigo put it. Asano and Kojima were doing Maths and Communication.

They almost walked from one end of Hamburg to the other, talking, holding hands, breathing white air. In the evening, the Christmas-lights came on and the look in Ichigo's eyes as he watched the city blink was enough to have Ishida melt a little, even though his ears might get frostbite.

They took the train back to his apartment and stayed in bed the next day.

Ichigo left the following Monday.

Ishida followed him six months later.

Ichigo stirs next to him but doesn't wake. Ishida begins feeling pathetic for watching him this religiously, gets up, and goes out into the kitchen to do the dishes. Five people generate Everest in an evening and since it was Ichigo's turn to do them and he'd prioritized spending time with Ishida, the dishes hadn't been done.

Ishida washes and dries, washes and dries, changes dishtowel and continues.

He's scrubbing a pot with burned rice, when Sado appears in the doorway. He opens the fridge and looks at the clock. It's midnight, but most of them have classes or work tomorrow so bedtime's usually around 10 pm. Sado pulls out a carton of milk and drinks from it directly.

"Can't sleep?" he asks as he spares Ishida another glass to wash.

Ishida shakes his head, pours out the dirty water and fills it again.

"Ichigo's worn himself out this past week," Sado tells him and leans against the tabletop. Ishida slows his washing.

"Why?"

"He's been alternating between a nervous wreck and bouncing off the walls because you were coming home." The way he pronounces home makes it clear that there's an invitation to move in here. Ishida swallows and licks his lips, scrubbing the last of the burnt rice off.

Sado closes the milk and puts it back, "I just wanted to make sure you knew that he's just as bad as you are."

"I'm sure I have no idea what you're talking about," Ishida replies.

Sado nods and smiles. The minute he's out the door, Ishida breaks into a soft smile.

"He's in the kitchen," he hears Sado say from the hallway. Ichigo appears moments later and looks between the dishes to Ishida.

"You didn't have to do that," he says and grabs a towel. He yawns as he picks up the burnt rice pot and dries it. He frowns while he does, "Wasn't this burnt?"

"I washed it," Ishida says, hyperaware that Ichigo's only wearing boxers next to him and the past year has done him good.

"You gonna do the laundry next?" he slurs tiredly. Ishida slaps his arm.

They do the dishes and go back to bed. Ichigo falls asleep immediately and Ishida rolls his eyes.

He sits up and looks out the window. One thing he missed in his imprisonment was being able to see. He'd always enjoyed watching, observing. Maybe that's one of the reasons he's drawn to Ichigo. There's always something going on with him. Ishida wonders whether or not Ichigo knows he's never quiet. Even when he's not doing anything or when he's reading, he's fidgeting, tapping his fingers, changing his expressions to match what he's reading.

Ishida looks down at Ichigo and leans down, kissing his shoulder.

Ichigo hums and Ishida lies down next to him.

"I wanted to come with you, but I wasn't sure you wanted me too," Ichigo mumbles.

"I did," Ishida responds quietly.

Ichigo smiles sleepily, "That was one and a half year of unnecessary angst then."

He's gone within the minute and Ishida strokes his hair. He falls asleep, his fingers ghosting Ichigo's hands, smiling too.


End file.
